


Sex, Lies and Red K

by meyari



Category: Smallville
Genre: Alternate Reality, Angst, Drugs, Dubious Consent, M/M, Red Kryptonite, Rimming
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-02
Updated: 2009-12-02
Packaged: 2017-10-04 02:41:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 25,856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meyari/pseuds/meyari
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Lex sent Clark away, it set into action a chain of events that led to places neither of them expected.  Fortunately, neither of them seemed able to stay away from the other for very long or the world might have been lost in the process.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sex, Lies and Red K

**Author's Note:**

> AU in that Clark &amp; Lex didn't meet until Clark was 16 after the summer in Metropolis.

"Stay away from me, Clark."

Lex's words were as cold as ice, chilling the room and sending a shiver down Clark's spine. He stared at Lex's back for a long moment, his jaw dropped open in shock. He made an interrogative noise, unable to find words beyond that. Lex turned at looked at Clark with eyes so hard that they might as well have been made from stone.

Everything that they'd been for the last two years, both the friendship and the relationship they'd begun building since Clark turned eighteen, seemed to be gone. Clark's heart thumped hard in a sort of pain that he hadn't felt in a while, not since the days of pining for Lana and then having to dump her once he realized whom he really cared about.

"Lex?"

"Go." Lex didn't say anything else. He just nodded at the door to his study and turned away, going back to his paperwork and computer.

"I can't believe this," Clark breathed, staring at him.

Lex had become nearly his whole world since they met on the bridge over the Loeb River two years ago. Granted they'd been lying to each other most of that time. Clark had been hiding his powers and his true nature. Lex had been hiding the less-than-legal activities he and his father had going on in the plant. They'd always danced around each other's secrets like they were landmines waiting to go off.

The secrets seemed to be a natural part of their relationship. Both of them offered obvious lies and pleas for understanding without explanations rather than the truth. Clark thought they took turns hiding things. Lex had his diamond earring girls. Clark had his bank robberies and Red K incidents. Lex would get clubbed over the head and be fine the next day. Clark would catch bullets and appear out of nowhere to save Lex.

It hadn't mattered, not that much. They'd still been friends. They had helped each other with so much while they danced around the things that they were both too afraid to share. Every time one of Lex's past indiscretions came up Clark could see the fear in his eyes that this would be the thing that would push Clark away. He was sure that Lex saw the same fear in Clark's eyes every time he used his powers and Lex saw it.

It had almost turned into a game, though it was a bitter little game that always put their friendship on shaky ground. Maybe if Clark had been younger, say fourteen instead of sixteen, things would have been easier but he was just old enough and more than wise enough after his summer in Metropolis to know that Lex was looking for more than just a friend when he sought Clark out.

It got easier when they'd finally changed the game from pretend friendship into real seduction. Once they both made that move—almost simultaneously to their amusement at the time—the differences and lies became just part of the package. Lex lied and twisted everything that Clark said. Clark hid his powers and challenged Lex on his past.

They argued, fought, sometimes threw things at each other. Then they'd kiss and make love and it was better because of the flares of passion. Clark suspected that it would have been stellar if they could be open with each other. Neither of them seemed willing to do that. They had both talked many times about breaking it off. Clark thought this might be what this was. Lex had finally made his choice and didn't want Clark anymore. Clark had always suspected that Lex would get tired of him and the fighting eventually. He just hadn't expected it to happen so soon.

"Lex," Clark pleaded, putting all of his love and loss into the word. He didn't think he could live without Lex, not anymore.

Lex ignored him utterly, clearly refusing to respond to Clark. After a long moment of considering shouting, throwing things, crying, and grabbing Lex to kiss him into submission, Clark let his shoulders slump. He should have known that Lex didn't feel the same way about him. Lex was way beyond Clark: too smart, too rich, way too everything for a farm boy from Kansas. He'd been entertainment. He was just Lex's farm boy squeeze on the side and now that was over. They'd had one argument too many, and Lex was done.

Clark made a little noise that was embarrassingly like a whimper. There was anger inside of him but it was drowning under the pain he felt. Lex sighed, looked up and glared at Clark with cold eyes that showed only annoyance at his continued presence in the room. Clark bit his lip and left, not daring to look back, especially after he heard Lex sigh 'finally' once he'd walked out the door.

Clark headed home, walking instead of running. He needed the time to think. He couldn't figure out why Lex would have done this out of the blue, and unfortunately there was no one that he could talk to it about. Pete was gone, having moved out of town to stay with his Mom after the divorce.

Chloe was a great friend but she asked so many uncomfortable questions. He'd never told her about Lex because he knew that she still had a crush on him, no matter how she denied it. She really wasn't someone that he'd want to talk to about having been dumped by his boyfriend. He certainly wouldn't have told Lana, not that she was in Smallville anymore. She'd never come back from her summer in Paris.

And Mom and Dad were the very last people he wanted to tell about his secret affair. He already knew how his dad felt about gays, and to have him say those things about Lex (or Clark) wasn't something Clark could deal with. Mom might be sympathetic but she'd say how much better off he'd be without Lex and offer to set him up with some nice girl in town.

No, there was no one to tell and no one to complain to anymore. He held out on telling Mom and Dad about the order to stay away for a full day and a half, which was pretty good considering how much Mom pestered him. She had always been able to see straight through him.

"He told you to stay away?" Dad said, looking delighted as well as slightly surprised.

"Yeah," Clark said, poking at his lunch. "No explanation of why, just stay away. I don't get it. Sure, we've had a lot of fights but I thought we were friends. How can you just turn a switch and decide not to be friends anymore?"

"I'm sure there's more to it, sweetie," Mom said, patting his arm. "Maybe he just needs some time. He is very busy and you were taking a pretty large chunk of his time by visiting so much."

"At least now you can focus on your grades, young man," Dad said as he nodded agreement with Mom. "After all the trouble you had two summers ago and the way Sheriff Adams is watching you, it would be good for you to buckle down a bit. You do need to get a scholarship if you want to go to college."

"I know, Dad," Clark said, sighing. They would have to bring that up again.

Clark did try to follow Lex's order. He also knew he didn't do a very good job of it. In his defense, it was hard to avoid someone in a town as small as Smallville. He saw Lex all over the place. Every time their paths crossed Lex gave him that same cold look that said stay away. It hurt. He knew that the hurt showed but what else could he do? Lex meant too much for him to let it go.

"What in the world happened between you two?" Chloe asked after witnessing one chilly encounter on Main Street. They were waiting for their coffees in the Beanery. "I thought you were best friends or something."

"So did I," Clark said bitterly as he took his coffee and handed Chloe her cappuccino. "Apparently Lex didn't see it that way."

"Well, it's probably for the best, Clark," Chloe said, patting his arm sympathetically. "You two really don't have that much in common. I never understood what you two talked about all the time anyway."

"Everything," Clark said, sighing as they sat at one of the tables close to the window. He could see Lex walking down the street to his Porsche. "Anything. Nothing. What do we talk about, Chloe? I could ask him almost anything and he'd answer me. We just…got along really well."

"If it was anyone else I'd have said that you two were dating," Chloe quipped, grinning as Clark choked on his coffee. "Sorry, my bad. Should have waited until you were done."

"Chloe!" Clark squawked, wiping the coffee off of his face and dabbing at the spots on his shirt. "That's not funny!"

"Sure was funny from this side of the table," Chloe said, grinning at him. "Seriously, I really think you're better off staying away from him, Clark. I talked to Sheriff Adams the other day and she mentioned that Lex has filed charges against Lionel for killing his grandparents, counterfeiting, and a whole bunch of other things. You know that Lionel's not going to take it lying down. It's going to be dangerous to be around Lex until the trial's over."

"Why were you talking to Sheriff Adams?" Clark asked, instantly nervous.

"She's looking for this guy who robbed some banks in Metropolis," Chloe said. She leaned on the table and looked at him with a fascinated expression. "She said that he appeared to have super powers, like he was invulnerable. There was a shoot out and the police shot him like a hundred times but the bullets bounced off. Then he disappeared, teleported somewhere else with the money. They've never found a trace of him. After spending the last couple of years in Smallville Sheriff Adams thinks that maybe it was a meteor freak so she came to me to see what info I might have. I'm looking into it but I haven't heard of anyone like that before. Should be interesting to investigate."

"Yeah, good luck with that," Clark said as his stomach sank right down to his shoes.

Clark started avoiding Chloe after that. He knew that she'd find some way to bring him into the investigation and he really, really, _really_ didn't want that. He knew how terrible he was at lying to the people he cared about. He knew Chloe. She'd find all the crimes, link them together and she'd figure out that it was him.

He didn't want to go to jail. He knew that he'd broken the law but he couldn't disappoint his parents that way. The two times he let her catch him in the Torch's office after school were so uncomfortable that he simply didn't give her a chance to catch him again after that. He completely understood her hurt and anger at his 'abandoning' her but he couldn't risk her finding out his secret history as Kal. Once he cut Chloe out of his life he was literally alone all the time. He hadn't realized how few friends he had left.

Two weeks after Clark's summary banishment from his life Lex moved back to Metropolis. The trial had generated a huge publicity storm so everyone in town was relieved when Lex left. They'd all gotten tired of the reporters and paparazzi interrogating them and snapping random pictures. Lionel was charged with murder, arson, counterfeiting, and attempted murder, plus a host of minor charges that Clark knew were true from his time spent around Lex. Lionel was spinning it for all he was worth, telling sad stories of Lex's instability, debauchery and poor judgment. He trotted out the diamond earring girls. He added a few young men that Lex was supposed to have taken as lovers. He filled the press with stories of Lex's supposed drug problems when he was younger.

"That's no surprise," Dad drawled a couple of weeks after Lex's departure from Smallville.

"What?" Clark asked from the sink. He was washing up before dinner. He'd been trying as hard as he could to ignore the news. It hurt too much to know what Lex was going through without him.

"Lex hired a new bodyguard," Dad commented calmly. "Apparently he's in the hospital. There was an assassination attempt and he nearly died from poison. His bodyguard is a woman named Mercy Graves and she's completely upended Lex's security team."

"What?" Clark gasped. He left the kitchen with the dishtowel in hand to watch the rest of the report with Dad.

Lex had nearly died in the attempt. The police were finally treating the situation between him and Lionel seriously. All but five minutes of weather were dedicated to reporting on The Trial of the Century, as the reporters were calling it. There was in-depth analysis of the poison that Lex had been given. They chattered endlessly over Lex's likelihood of surviving. There was detailed coverage of the massive improvements in Lex's personal security, along with awed commentary about Mercy Graves' skills.

By the end of the news report, Dad had laid off his sarcastic remarks about how this was just what you'd expect out of a Luthor. Instead he switched to ranting about Lionel Luthor. Clark didn't consider it much of an improvement.

"I don't understand how a father can do that to his own son!" Dad complained all through dinner. As far as Clark was concerned was only marginally better than the snide remarks he'd been making about Lex. "Lex is his flesh and blood and Lionel's trying to destroy him!"

"Yes, dear," Mom said. She looked like she was as tired of the tirade as Clark was though neither of them said anything.

They let Dad rant until he lost his breath and clutched his chest. Mom caught him when he swayed and made him take his heart medication. She quietly scolded him for letting himself get worked up. The TV stayed off for the rest of the night and Clark's parents went to bed early that night.

Clark headed out to the loft. Lex had nearly died. He'd nearly died and Clark hadn't been there to protect him. Maybe Mercy would be good enough to keep Lex safe. Maybe not. Clark hesitated and second-guessed himself until almost 10:30 that night. He finally gave in to his worries and ran to Metropolis.

He took up a station in the back of the crowd of paparazzi staking out Lex's hospital. He didn't learn a lot that night. It looked like Lex was going to live against all the doctor's expectations. The next night he learned that Lex was sitting up and eating solid food. The third night he'd been released from the hospital and the paparazzi were full of stories about how the poison diagnosis had to have been wrong.

Clark didn't say anything about that to the paparazzi he'd made friends with. He was sure that the diagnosis had been right. Lex was able to survive things that no one else could, much like Clark could do things no one else could. Over the next week and a half, Clark kept running to Metropolis every night, spending at least several hours, sometimes staying so long that he didn't sleep at all. He knew he was stalking Lex and Lionel. He just didn't care.

It felt very odd to walking Metropolis' streets after so long away. He couldn't stay around Lex's building for too long without attracting attention, so he started wandering to some of his old haunts. A lot of the guys he'd hung out with were gone now, either dead or in prison or just plain disappeared, but a few of them remained. Clark was surprised to find that he was remembered, that 'Kal' had a reputation that had survived his two-year absence.

"Man, I thought you got killed or something," one of the guys said. "You disappeared and no one knew where you went. So where were you?"

"Got in trouble, got caught," Clark said, shrugging. "Took a while to get back out. Still dealing with things. You know how it is."

He put on Kal's mannerisms as he talked to the guy. The arrogance, the confidence, and the air of barely restrained power settled easily around him. It was like reclaiming a part of himself that he'd set aside. He squared his shoulders and lifted his chin to look down at the guy whose name he couldn't remember.

It was easier to be Kal since he'd been reprogrammed last summer and then rescued by Mom's black kryptonite. He didn't remember much of what he'd done while reprogrammed to be Kal-El the Last Kryptonian, but he could remember how it felt. The reprogramming was gone but the confidence and ability to be Kal remained.

At least he'd managed to gather all the Elements and create the Fortress while he was Kal-El. He hated to think what might have happened if someone else had gotten the Elements. Jor-El was crazy enough without human influence. He didn't need to be any worse. Of course, Clark still couldn't fly, so obviously he had more to learn just like Jor-El kept telling him.

"Yeah, I do," the guy asked, eyeing Clark speculatively. "Just can't figure out how someone could catch you. You were untouchable, man, completely untouchable."

They watched some girls walk by and then into the club that Lex had entered a couple of minutes before. The guy whistled appreciatively. Clark waited, wishing the guy would go away. He wanted to know what Lex was up to. The only way he'd be able to do that was if he could home in on Lex's conversation. Clark still couldn't listen to something else and have a conversation at the same time.

"You need some quick cash?" the guy asked. "There's a job offer out on the streets but no one's crazy enough to take them up on it. Might be your sort of thing, though."

"What is it?" Clark asked. They both stiffened as a cop car slowly rolled by.

Old habits died hard or maybe it was Sheriff Adam's influence. Clark was pretty sure that she knew he was Kal. He was pretty sure that she knew that Kal had done the bank robberies. He knew that if she had even a shred of proof she'd have arrested him already, so his main focus back in Smallville was not giving her the chance to find out anything definitive. He had no doubt that she had contacts in Metropolis, so he wasn't about to let himself get arrested here.

"There's a hit on that Luthor kid, the bald one," the guy said quietly enough that they wouldn't be overheard despite the crowd trying to get into the club a few feet away. "Daddy Dearest wants his boy out of the way before the trial can start up. Looks like the poison didn't work and that bodyguard bitch of his is one scary damned woman. No one can get close enough to do the job right. Everyone on the street is afraid to try after the last guy disappeared. So Daddy Dearest is looking for someone who can get in and out without being caught. Used to be right up your alley. Never could figure out how you did half the stuff you did."

Clark felt like his blood turned to ice in his veins. That was the last thing he'd expected to hear. It was one thing to hear on the news that something had happened to Lex. It was another thing entirely to find out that Lionel was literally willing to solicit murder to get rid of Lex. He did his best not to let his shock and disgust show, but he didn't think he was very successful at it from the expression on the guy's face.

"Don't do that sort of thing anymore," Clark said with a shrug that was almost casual. "That's how I got caught. It's stupid. I'm not going through that again. No way."

"Daddy Dearest is offering something like a million dollars for it," the guy said, shaking his head in amazement. "Glad my dad isn't that much of an ass. Sure he's a drunk but he wouldn't kill me."

Clark nodded and checked his watch. He should head home. He really should. Lex might be at the club for hours, despite the fact that he clearly wasn't feeling well. He had his bodyguard. He didn't need Clark to guard over him, except that he did. He always had. Clark made his excuses, barely remembering as he left that the guy's name had been Rex something-or-other, which made the guy beam at him.

"You need anything now that you're free again, you let me know," Rex said, shaking Clark's hand. "See you around, Kal."

Clark walked away. He focused his hearing inside of the club until he located Lex's voice. Lex was talking to someone else, an older man whose voice Clark didn't recognize at all. It was hard with the music playing. Clark ducked into an alleyway so that he could focus on just listening. He couldn't walk and listen at the same time, not with all that background noise. A couple of guys were kissing and groping each other. They didn't notice him so he ignored them in favor of listening to Lex.

*The price has gone up,* a deep man's voice said. *Things have changed and there's a real danger of us being caught.*

*I'm aware of that,* Lex said. His voice was calm, determined and reassuring all at once. *I have no problem with ensuring that you're better compensated for this. It's a huge risk and you'll be an enormous amount of danger if you go through with it. No one understands that better than I do.*

*No doubt,* the deep man's voice said. *You going to survive? This is all a moot point if you don't.*

*I'll survive,* Lex said, voice going grim. *I won't allow him to kill me before he's thrown in prison.*

*All right then,* the deep man's voice said. *You keep up your end of the bargain and I'll keep up mine.*

Clark bit his lip. He listened as Lex left the club. Lex told his driver that he was returning to the penthouse. Clark managed to get a tiny glimpse of him as he got into his limo before his new bodyguard Mercy blocked his line of sight. He followed along behind the limo, thinking desperately. He didn't know what Lex was setting up with the guy he'd talked to but it couldn't be anything good, not after the assassination attempts.

Lex had told him so many times that Clark kept his dark side in check. Clark had seen how he moderated Lex's more frightening, destructive impulses. Lex did the same thing for Clark, keeping his tendency to mope and angst in check. , Clark fidgeted outside once they got to Lex's building. He stared up at the penthouse Lex now lived in. Was the conversation he'd overheard Lex commissioning a hit on Lionel or something else entirely? He had no way to know. He'd find out eventually but it might be too late by then.

Clark worried about it over the next couple of days as he went to school, did chores, and then ran to Metropolis each night. It was entirely too easy to slip back into Kal's old ways, to find Kal's old 'buddies,' the ones who'd helped him party. They weren't quite as welcoming when they found out that Kal didn't have easy money anymore, but they understood wanting to keep your nose clean after 'getting out'. He asked tons of questions about what Lionel and Lex were up to and quickly found out a lot more than he'd expected.

Lionel had taken over where Morgan Edge left off. Edge had apparently died under mysterious circumstances according to Rex and his friends. Clark still wasn't sure of that. He thought Edge was dead. He should be dead. Most people did die when they tried to ram Clark with their car at 60 miles an hour. Despite that he wasn't sure of it. Edge had survived what looked like a fatal explosion so you never could be too sure. He kept expecting Edge to show up again, especially as he made his way through Metropolis' clubs and the Suicide Slums.

Whether Edge was truly dead or not, Lionel had secretly taken over for Edge, becoming a mob boss in secret. He had a figurehead named Boss Manheim who did the day-to-day work, but Lionel gave the orders. Everyone in the Slums knew it. Edge's former goons now had access to drugs that gave them superpowers. They had weapons that they'd never have been able to afford before, some of which had kryptonite in them. It was obvious to Clark that Lionel was up to more than mere crime.

Rex and his buddies were on the edges of Intergang (Lionel's new gang). They hung around and pretended that they were more important than they truly were. Rex introduced Clark to some of the real gang members who immediately tried to recruit him. It was creepy the way they looked at him. Clark was certain that they knew what he could do, at least some of it. Edge had known so there was no reason for them not to know too. The one who tried the hardest to recruit him was Noose. He was some sort of cousin of Rex's. He was around a lot when Clark joined Rex and his friends at the clubs and bars they frequented.

"Boss Manheim'd love to have you join up," Noose said with a decidedly creepy smile a couple of days after their first introduction. "There's lots of opportunities with Intergang. We'd keep the cops off of your back."

"No thanks," Clark said solemnly. "I appreciate the offer but I'm done with that sort of thing. I'm out and I'm staying out. It's just hard to stay away from the old haunts, you know? I kind of missed the guys, idiots though they are."

"Sure, sure," Noose said, nodding sagely. "If you change your mind, let me know."

"Will do," Clark said and was infinitely grateful when they went their separate ways for the night. Clark fully expected another recruiting attempt the next time he saw Noose. He didn't look like the type to give up.

The next day after school Clark headed up into his loft with a sigh. He was incredibly grateful that it was Friday. He wasn't sure that he could be the good boy much longer when he was running away to Metropolis to stalk Lex, consort with thugs and gang members at night. He didn't have any homework to do. He needed to spend some time on the web to see if he could find out anything more about Intergang. He wanted to check the gossip columns to see if there was any new information about Lex. He wanted to see if the blogs had updates on the trial. He wanted to see Lex, talk to Lex, be around Lex, touch Lex, and fuck Lex, even though he knew it wasn't going to happen. All he could do was stalk Lex and be satisfied with glimpses at a distance.

"You're treading on very thin ice, Mr. Kent," a woman's voice said from the shadows as he reached the top of the stairs. "My employer told me to inform you that he appreciates your persistence but that he instructed you to stay away from him. You are not following those instructions very well."

"You're Mercy," Clark said without thinking as he stared at her. He immediately wished he could kick himself. God, he sounded like an idiot!

"I am," she said. Her eyes narrowed in a truly ferocious glare. "You will explain what you have been doing shadowing my employer and then you will stop."

"Not here," Clark said. He checked the house with his hearing and X-ray vision. Mom and Dad were still up. "Not where my parents could hear. Come on. Out in the fields where they can't see us."

Mercy didn't look happy about that but after a fierce glare almost made Clark's flannel burst into flame she followed him. They slipped out of the barn and headed into one of the farther out fields, the one with the copse of trees that hid everything inside of it. It had always been a great hiding spot. It was right in the middle of the property. It was so far from any roads that no one could get close without crossing multiple lines of barbed wire fencing. Mercy nodded somewhat approvingly of his choice of location before fixing those icy eyes on Clark.

"Look, Lex and I used to be lovers," Clark said as he blushed brightly that he'd said it out loud for the first time, "and I suppose Lex thinks that he's protecting me by pushing me away. Given some of what his dad's up to and the whole trial thing, I can see it. But I…can't stay away from him. I've only loved one other person, Ms. Graves and what I felt for Lana is nowhere near what I feel for Lex. I literally can't stay away from him."

"I see," Mercy said. She sighed as if this was the last thing she wanted to hear.

"Did you know that the price on Lex's head has gone up to $1.5 million?" Clark asked her seriously. "It's getting to the point that people are going to go for it on the off chance that they get lucky. Lionel's running Intergang now and he's arming them with—"

"What?" Mercy snapped. She went on alert and becoming at least a thousand times scarier than she had been a second before. "How do you know that?"

"Oh, I um, kind of, well…" Clark floundered for a moment and then gave up the lies and hiding. Mercy probably already knew most of this. She seemed like the sort of person who could learn anything simply by glaring at you. "I ran away to Metropolis two summers ago and spent all my time robbing banks and automatic tellers so that I could go party, and I know people there on the wrong side of the law, and they knew people in Intergang, and we were in a bar and Noose was there, so Rex, the guy I know best, introduced me to him and they tried to recruit me, and everyone on the street knows that Lionel's the one in charge of Intergang now. I mean after all he and Morgan Edge started off together in Suicide Slums so of course they turned to Lionel for help once Edge died, at least everyone's pretty sure he died. I think he died. You usually don't survive hitting something at sixty miles an hour, no matter who you are but he'd 'died' once before, so I'm withholding judgment for now. Lord knows he might come back again and I don't want to be unprepared if he does."

Mercy held up a hand to stop the flood of words, her eyes sparkling with something that might be amusement but also might be the urge to kill rising. Clark couldn't tell so he stopped talking. Someday he really needed to learn how to _not_ babble when he was nervous.

"You robbed banks?" Mercy said, lips twitching.

"Yeah," Clark said with a sigh. "A few times. Didn't get much money out of it. Cash machines are a better haul if you can get them open."

"You know about Lionel's history in the Slums," Mercy said a little speculatively.

"Doesn't everyone?" Clark asked surprised. "I mean, not here in Smallville or in the better parts of Metropolis, but everyone in the Slums and on the wrong side of the law in Metropolis knows about it. It's common knowledge, like the counterfeiting and arson thing. It's just that no one will talk about it."

"Would you?" Mercy asked as she stared at him intently. "Would you testify to what you'd learned in court?"

Clark hesitated, mouth open. He wanted to say yes. God, he wanted to! If he said yes, then maybe Lex would take him back. If he said yes, maybe the trial would be over sooner and people would stop trying to kill Lex. If he said yes, maybe they could get Lionel thrown in jail and he wouldn't hire people to kill Lex. But he couldn't. There was too much hanging over Clark's head for him to do it without some hope of escaping jail time.

"Um, if I admitted to knowing that I'd have to admit how I know that," Clark said while scuffing his toe in the fallen leaves, "and given that I sort of robbed a few banks and a lot of automatic tellers and stole some cars and, um, I'd probably be arrested. Besides I didn't want to tell Lex about what I did. He looks up to me and I'm afraid that he'd think badly of me. That's the worst thing that could happen as far as I'm concerned, along with letting my parents down. I've done enough of that already. I don't want to do anymore, not after my dad ruined his heart stopping me that summer."

Mercy sighed and shook her head at Clark, giving him a look that said as clearly as any of his mom's stern looks that he was being a child and needed to grow up. Clark winced. He really didn't want to get arrested. Granted, he'd been a minor when he'd stolen the money and done the other stuff but he still worried about getting caught. It would destroy his parents, especially his dad. Dad's heart problems were getting worse and Clark was worried that he'd die if he had too big of a shock.

"That explains several things," Mercy said, studying him with a tiny smile on her lips that was almost scarier than the glares had been. "All right, this is what we will do. Tonight you will go to Metropolis in your normal fashion. You will inform your friends that you are going to take the hit. Then you will leave Metropolis and come home. Tomorrow you will come to Metropolis again. You will make your way into the penthouse before midnight. I shall take care of things on Lex's side. Do not allow yourself to be talked into meeting the head of Intergang. There is a price on your head as well. My employer has been blocking that, which is why he's annoyed about your stalking. You're leaving yourself entirely too open while you do it."

"Uh, what?" Clark stared at her with his jaw dropped open. "Ummm, what do you mean 'make my way'? And someone wants to kidnap me again? Or is it a kill? When did that happen?"

"Mr. Luthor has informed me of your… past accomplishments, Mr. Kent," Mercy said. The way she looked at him making it clear that she _knew_ what he could do, possibly better than he did. "You will do as you are told. If you do so, my employer will be safe, as will you. You have made yourself such a huge part of my employer's life that you are also my responsibility as of this moment. I will not tolerate failure in this endeavor. Be in the penthouse before midnight by whatever means you deem appropriate. Is that clear?"

"Yes, ma'am," Clark said. He swallowed hard at the ice in Mercy's voice. "I'll do my best ma'am."

"Go."

Clark hesitated for a second. He opened his mouth to ask another question and then snapped it shut at Mercy's glare. He hurried back to the barn to wait for Mom and Dad went to bed. Once they were asleep he ran to Metropolis. He determinedly tried not to think at all, which meant that all of it was swirling through the back of his head as he reached Metropolis.

"You wanna go party?" Rex asked when Clark showed up at the bar where he most frequently saw Rex and the Intergang group. "I heard about a really good rave down on 156th. Just your style."

"No, no money," Clark said, sighing. He could see several of Rex's friends around, as well as Noose in a booth in the back of the bar. Noose was watching Clark like a hawk as always. At least this time he didn't come over immediately to try to recruit Clark. "I'm getting really sick of no money."

"Hey, Noose asked about you again," Rex said with a nod at the back of the bar. He smiled encouragingly. "You could always join up. I hear they got some real perks and they get a ton of money. Noose always has money to throw around."

"Nah," Clark shook his head. "I'm not a joiner. Parties are fine but joining up like that, no way. No, I was thinking about Daddy Dearest's project. What's that up to now?"

"Seriously?" Rex blinked at him in surprise. "Last I heard it was $1.8 but that's a stupid way to go, man. Two guys have tried it and they both got iced."

"No one ever said I was smart," Clark said with one of Kal's reckless grins on his face. "I think I might try it. I'm pretty sure I can get out even if I fail. I've got a better chance than anyone else, if I do say so myself."

"Hey, whatever." Rex looked moderately horrified as well as a little excited. "You want to go for it, go for it. I'll pass the word if you want. Let everyone know to back off while you make your attempt."

Clark spent a second apparently thinking about it. Noose watched him even more closely than normal. Clark suspected that he had some version of enhanced hearing or maybe he was really good a reading lips. It didn't matter either way. Clark was going to protect Lex and if Mercy thought that making the attempt to kill Lex would protect him, well, Clark had to trust her. He suspected that if he didn't he might end up very dead no matter how invulnerable and alien he was.

"Do it," Clark declared at last. "I'm going to go check things out, see what I can come up with. Worst comes to worst, I'll smash my way in and out. Worked pretty well in the past."

"Good luck!"

Clark ran home to quietly hyperventilated in the loft. He almost wished he had some Red K so that he'd have the nerve to do what he needed to do. The thought of someone else taking a shot at Lex and succeeding was enough to make him calm down eventually. Mom kept asking if he was all right the next day, but Clark told her that he was worried about a test next week. Once the chores were done Clark disappeared to his loft. He did a lot of searches on what he could be charged with in an obsessive way to avoid thinking about Lex getting murdered. The bank robbery still scratched away at the back of his mind. The thought that he was adding accepting a murder contract to that made him want to whimper.

He was so visibly upset at dinner that Dad asked what was wrong and tried to give Clark advice that had absolutely nothing to do with anything. Clark took it with as much grace as he could, telling them that he was going to go for a run to try and calm down. He did go for a run, heading down to Miami and then over to New Orleans and then off to Los Angeles and up to Seattle before going back to Metropolis. He ran around town, staying out of everyone's sight. He wasn't at all surprised that Suicide Slums was buzzing about how Kal was going to try for the big hit. Apparently Lionel and Intergang were delighted. They wanted to talk to Kal in person before he made the attempt. Clark ran back to Smallville to wait until dark.

"Are you all right now, sweetie?" Mom asked as he got himself some coffee.

"Yeah, I'm just worried about Lex, Mom," Clark told her, trying to be as calm as possible. "I heard that someone put out a hit on Lex. They want to pay nearly $2 million to have him killed. That's a lot of money. Someone's going to make the attempt. You know they will."

"There's nothing you can do about that, Clark." Mom took his free hand and patting it. "I know that you wish that you and Lex had remained friends but he made his choice. He's got good people protecting him and the police have to be aware of this. They'll make sure that he's safe. You have to concentrate on getting good grades so that you can keep your scholarship."

"Yes ma'am." Clark smiled weakly and let her hug him.

He was really grateful when she went to bed with Dad. He headed out into the barn and waited for time to pass. He had to wait until after dark or he wouldn't be able to get close to the building. He also had to wait until the guards and police guarding Lex had relaxed a bit, which meant waiting until nearly 11:30 pm before running back to Metropolis. The police at the base of Lex's building were fairly alert though they looked like they were starting to relax. Lex's security personnel were on high alert and showed no signs of relaxing anytime in the next decade. That didn't surprise Clark given that Mercy was their boss. There was no way that he could get in through the ground floor so Clark broke into the building next door. He went up to the roof with it's huge rotating planet and nodded. He could easily see into Lex's penthouse from where he stood in the shadows.

Lex was pacing. His hands were shaking as he gestured. Mercy was there, looking cold, calm and downright deadly. There wasn't much more in the way of security visible in Lex's penthouse but when Clark used his X-ray vision he could see sensors all through the penthouse and the four floors below it. There were police officers stationed one floor below.

There was also a skeleton moving carefully and cautiously through the vents to get into place directly over Lex's living room. Clark stared at that skeleton and listened hard. It wasn't a cop, not with that sort of language the skeleton was whispering or the strange way his body bent as he squirmed through the too-small vent ducting. It wasn't one of Lex's security guys who all looked human. It had to be one of the Intergang super powered thugs. He was carrying a gun that had bullets that Clark was sure were kryptonite from the strange way they looked on his scan.

"All right," Clark breathed. He braced himself and then bounced on his toes. "No time left. Here I come, Lex."

He took a deep breath and then ran at the edge of the building, jumping at the last instant so that he'd be carried straight across the gap towards the balcony around Lex's penthouse. For one heart stopping instant he thought he wasn't going to make it. He wished desperately for the flight that he had yet to master, running in space as he jumped across the street.

Time slowed down in that way it always did when Clark sped up. He could see the way Mercy's eyes tracked Lex as he paced. He could see Lex's pale eyelashes as he blinked in the middle of a word. The noise from the traffic below faded away and then time sped up again as he realized he was going to make it. Clark smashed through the balcony windows, sending glass flying everywhere.

*Fucking hell!* the Intergang thug cursed from the vent over the living room.

Clark heard his arm slither strangely as he pulled his gun out of the holster. Mercy was already moving. She grabbed Lex to get him out but she was taking Lex directly into the line of fire. Clark tackled Lex, knocking him to the ground and draping himself over Lex. He was pretty sure that this was going to hurt. He couldn't allow Lex to be shot, not when there was a chance for him to stop it.

Clark gasped as pain bloomed in his right shoulder, then below his right shoulder blade and then a few inches lower in his rib cage. Mercy was shouting something that Clark didn't hear. The bullets were kryptonite. His whole body shuddered as the agony of it shot through him. It didn't matter that he was in pain. The pain was all on his back, none of it was on his front, so he'd shielded Lex. Lex wasn't hurt. The pain almost didn't hurt because of the sheer relief that Lex wasn't going to die.

"You idiot, get off of me!" Lex snapped furiously. He shoved at Clark's chest.

"Gun," Clark breathed. He heard more shots being fired but unable to tell where they were coming from. No more points of pain bloomed on his body so it must be Mercy doing the shooting. "Had to…protect you…"

"Clark?" Lex's voice changed from anger to shock and fear. "Clark, are you all right?"

"Never…stopped…loving you…Lex." Clark breathed into Lex's ear as the world faded away into pain and the slow drain of his blood out onto the floor.

He heard Lex's voice but couldn't understand it. There was urgency and fear and then towering rage. The rage was replaced by sharp commands and shoves that Clark couldn't respond to. His body wasn't listening as the kryptonite bullets short-circuited him. The pain kept increasing the longer the bullets stayed in his body but as his blood drained out he felt like he was drifting away from his body.

It was okay. Lex wasn't hurt. Lex would be all right. That was all that mattered to Clark. He felt himself lifted onto something that had to be a stretcher and wanted to protest 'no hospitals' but his lips wouldn't move and it was so hard to breathe. He blacked out as they started moving. The last thing he was aware of was Lex's voice snapping orders he couldn't follow.

Clark woke with sunshine pouring down on his face to warm him straight through. He took a deep breath that felt like the first in decades and sighed as he let the breath back out again slowly. The sun felt wonderful. Nothing could ever feel as good as this. After a minute or two enjoying the sun something blocked it. Clark grumbled and opened his eyes reluctantly.

"Clark?" Lex asked. His eyes were too bright with something that looked like tears. "Oh my god, Clark! You're breathing."

"Yeah?" Clark asked, a little confused. "Of course. What happened?"

"You stopped breathing after we removed the bullets," Lex said. There were tears running down his cheeks. "Your heart stopped. Nothing we did made any difference. I wouldn't let them examine you or take your body away but Mercy insisted that we turn your body over to your parents by nightfall."

"It's morning?" Clark asked as he tried to sit up. He winced at what felt like huge bruises on his back. They seemed to be fading quickly with the sunshine pouring down on him. "What time is it?"

"About 9:00 am," Lex said. He dashed the tears away. "I didn't realize that you could heal like—no, never mind! It doesn't matter. You're okay. That's all that matters."

"It does matter, Lex," Clark said softly. He caught Lex's hand before he could bolt. "It's always mattered. I was too afraid to say anything. Thought I'd lose you when you found out what I am, not that it matters. You already stopped loving me."

"I didn't say I didn't love you." Lex glared at Clark. "I said stay away from me."

"It was the same thing to me," Clark whispered with his heart in his throat. "It took me ages to realize that you were trying to protect me."

"So why did you go and get involved with those thugs who were trying to murder me?" Lex demanded, eyes full of anger now.

"I already knew them." Clark shrugged and then winced. The bruises weren't quite gone yet. "I knew them from the summer I ran away to Metropolis. I was Kal, super powered bank robber and party boy. It was before I met you. Some really bad things happened at home and I ran away to Metropolis and… it's a long story."

"You robbed banks?" Lex blinked at him in surprise.

"And automatic tellers. There's a better haul there." Clark nodded. "Banks usually have a pretty small amount of cash, all things considered. And you had to be careful of the ink packets. Those armored trucks are the best choices but they're too conspicuous and the police make a huge fuss about them. Tellers are easy. Destroy the cameras from a distance, go in and tear the cash machines open, take the cash, speed away. I was… pretty high that summer."

"I have a hard time picturing you high," Lex's lips quirked in an almost admiring smile. "Makes me wonder how you'd act."

"You've seen it," Clark said, making a face. "Remember when I got more and more paranoid, more greedy for money? That was me on drugs. I was less paranoid the summer I spent in Metropolis but just as greedy and violent."

"Hmm," Lex nodded slowly. "I suppose that makes sense. Repeated exposure to a drug will tend to cause paranoia. I'm glad you haven't used it since. I certainly feel better since I stopped brewing up drugs and testing them out myself."

"You did what?" Clark asked, surprised. "Lex, you barely drink, much less do drugs!"

"This was years ago," Lex shrugged. "I was rebelling against what Father wanted me to be. I'm good at chemistry so I brewed up designer drugs and sold them at school. I tended to fuck a lot since I like sex even more when I'm high and I'd always try the drugs first. It was a mess."

Clark grinned at Lex who grinned back. He wasn't sure who made the first move but suddenly they were kissing like they had never been apart except that it was much hotter than it had ever been. Clark hoped that they were finally going to have sex again but a cough sounded from the doorway. Lex nearly jumped straight out of Clark's arms.

"As touching as this moment is," Mercy said in a tone of voice so cold that Clark suspected she didn't find it touching at all, "the Kents are on the phone demanding to talk to Clark. Shall I bring the phone in, sir?"

"Yes," Lex said with a sigh. He moved away from Clark as he put enough distance between them to be decent. "Yes, of course. Are the police still waiting to talk to me?"

"Yes, sir," Mercy said, offering the phone to Clark. She'd had it behind her back the whole time. "They also wish to speak to Mr. Kent about his presence here."

Clark took the phone while catching Lex's hand so that he couldn't leave. He took a deep breath, looked at Mercy and then said loudly enough that Mom or Dad (whichever was on the phone) could hear it: "A little privacy?"

"Of course," Lex said, also loudly enough that he could be heard.

Mercy's lips quirked. She waited a second before closing the door firmly. Lex sat at Clark's tug. Clark sighed as he lifted the phone to his ear. He'd had enough of hiding from everyone. He was still hiding from Mom and Dad, though eventually he'd have to tell them about Lex. From now on he wasn't going to hide anything from Lex and Mercy. If it got him kisses like that it would be totally worth it.

"Hello?" Clark asked. He hoped it would be Mom. She tended to be a lot more lenient than Dad.

"Clark!" Dad snapped furiously. "What the hell are you doing? We just about had a heart attack when you were gone this morning. Where have you been?"

"I'm sorry, Dad," Clark said and meant it. "I heard about a plot to kill Lex and I had to come to Metropolis to let him know about it. It took a lot to get in to talk to him but I finally did. Unfortunately it was just about then that this guy broke through the windows on the penthouse balcony and tried to shoot Lex. Ms. Graves managed to protect us but everything was so crazy that I just stayed. I should have called. I'm sorry Dad."

Lex stared at Clark with his jaw dropped open. It had to be the first time that he'd ever lied to his parents around Lex. It certainly wasn't the first time Clark had lied to them. He was a lot better at lying than people thought. He only had a hard time lying when it was to people he cared about. This time he didn't want to tell the truth. He didn't want them to know what he'd done. He didn't want Mom and Dad worrying about him going back to being Kal. He didn't want Lionel to get any ideas that Clark knew that he knew and Clark was certain that Lionel was bugging at least the farm's phone and probably Lex's phones, too.

"Clark, one of these days we're going to have a long, serious talk about your tendency to go off half cocked," Dad sighed. "You're all right?"

"I'm fine, Dad," Clark said truthfully. He was fine now. "They caught the guy and no one was hurt. I didn't have anything to do. Ms. Graves is so good she's scary."

Mercy grinned wickedly at him. Lex smirked. There was a level of admiration in his eyes that Clark had never seen before. It felt good, even though Clark suspected that it wasn't a good sort of admiration to have earned. Being a good liar wasn't something that Clark was supposed to be proud of but it felt way too nice to have Lex looking at him with pride again.

"When are you coming home?" Dad asked. He chuckled at Clark's description of Mercy.

"Um, I'm not sure," Clark said. "See, I know they're making breakfast and I was so worried last night that I really didn't eat much. I was hoping to get to have something to eat before I left and the police sort of wanted to ask me what I saw, not that I saw much. So… maybe this afternoon? Is that okay?"

"That's fine," Dad said though he didn't sound at all pleased. "But I expect you back by dinnertime, young man. We're going to have a long talk about your actions last night, understood?"

"Yes, sir," Clark said. He winced and made a face that made Lex bite his lip against a snicker. "I'm sorry, sir."

They said their goodbyes. Clark hung up with relief. He passed the phone to Mercy who took it with a raised eyebrow. Clark blushed, pretty sure she was commenting on his sudden ability to lie competently. Lex nudged Clark's leg. He looked equally curious.

"That was a surprisingly believable series of lies," Lex said.

"I _can_ lie, Lex," Clark sighed. "I don't do a good job of it when I want to tell someone the truth. I do _not_ want my parents to know what I've been up to, not with you, not as Kal, not any of it. I know I'll have to tell them eventually but right now, no. It's not worth it."

"You told horribly bad lies because you… didn't want to lie to me?" Lex asked incredulously.

Clark nodded. He knew it didn't make much sense. He turned to Mercy and swallowed hard because he knew she wasn't going to like his question. She didn't seem at all like the sort of person who liked having her work questioned. He was still afraid of her, even if he was mostly invulnerable.

"Um, ma'am?" Clark asked. "Is there any possibility that Lionel could be eavesdropping on us? I try and be really careful about what I say about what I can do if there's any possibility of people hearing me."

"There is no chance," Mercy declared so firmly that Clark rocked back a little bit. "This bedroom is soundproofed and the penthouse was swept for listening devices just before you woke up."

"Good," Clark said. He relaxed a little. He turned back to Lex who'd put on his 'no expression' face, the one that hid everything he was thinking. "Lex, I never wanted to lie to you but I've never had anyone other than my parents that I trusted with my powers. I never had anyone, anywhere that I trusted with everything. I've always been afraid that I'd lose you if I let you know how weird I was and you never told me the full truth either so why should I? Yes, I know that I started the lies with the first thing I ever said to you, but that doesn't matter now."

"What does matter, Clark?" Lex asked. His voice was as expressionless as his face.

"I love you," Clark said simply. "I love you so much that I literally cannot stay away from you. I went back to being Kal so that I could find out what was happening and who was targeting you. But I was afraid of losing you if I admitted to being Kal so I couldn't testify about what I learned. I robbed four banks, broke into something over fifty different ATMs, stole things, took and sold drugs, did just about everything illegal that you can think of short of killing people. I don't think I killed anyone, though I know I sent a few people to the hospital while I was Kal. I'm really afraid that if I admit to what I found out about your dad I'll be arrested and sent to jail. Granted, I was sixteen when I did all of this but Sheriff Adams is still after me and I'm pretty sure she knows that I'm Kal. Jail time is a real possibility."

"Fuck, Clark," Lex breathed. He looked away. "No wonder you were so defensive when I first met you."

"I'd just gotten back from Metropolis when you hit me with your car," Clark shrugged. "I wasn't readjusting to Smallville life very well. You always said that I grounded you and kept you from giving into your dark side Lex. I don't think you realized that you do the same thing for me. It would be so easy to be Kal. Thinking of you was what kept me from doing it."

Lex's head whipped back around and he stared at Clark, mouth dropped open slightly for a second. Mercy was standing there watching and listening but she had a strange ability to be practically invisible despite being right there in the room with them. Clark ignored her for the moment. He needed to get through to Lex and there was so much more he needed to say.

"You know I'm adopted," Clark continued. "The reason that my Dad hates the Luthor family is that your Dad helped fake my adoption records. On the day of the Smallville meteor shower Mom and Dad found me in a field with a very small spaceship. I was already obviously different, too strong and speaking a strange language that no one knew. They always wanted a child so they took me with them. Lionel flagged them down on the way home and they agreed to take you to the hospital. To pay them back for it he agreed to help with my adoption. Unfortunately he came back later and used it against Dad to get him to make Mr. Ross sell the plant."

Lex's eyes went wide, then very narrow as he worked through everything that Clark had said. Mercy shifted in the background but that was all she did. After a long moment Lex nodded, sighing and shaking his head sadly.

"No wonder your father loathes me," Lex said, his lips twisting into something that should have been a smile but wasn't. "This does explain why Father wanted the plant. He saw the changes in me after the meteor shower and wanted to study the meteors because of it."

"Probably," Clark nodded. "I know he's found a way to turn kryptonite into weapons. It's so volatile that it's useful that way."

"Kryptonite?" Lex asked.

He looked like he was starting to relax and believe that Clark was serious about telling him everything. Mercy perked up at the mention of weapons, which didn't surprise Clark at all. He thought she must be a weapon freak.

"It's the meteor rock," Clark explained. "They're all that's left of my home world, which was named Krypton. The green ones give off a radiation that hurts me. The bullets that hit me last night were green kryptonite. That's why they penetrated my skin and stopped my heart. The red ones are my personal drugs. They're what I was high on that summer. The black stuff will split me in two or nearly anyways. There might be other colors but those are the only ones that I've encountered so far."

"What can you do?" Mercy asked. She gave Lex a cold stare when he glared at her for interrupting.

"I'm invulnerable, except to kryptonite," Clark grinned at Lex's shocked look. "Super speed and hearing. I can run from Smallville to Metropolis in a matter of seconds. X-ray vision, which can be really useful but really disorienting. Heat vision, too, which is sort of like laser eyes. Um, I will be able to fly and I've had a couple of instances of super breath, but that's still developing and I can't control those powers yet. I have a Fortress in the Arctic that's all that I have left of Krypton. It's controlled by a download of my real father, and he's a little nuts, so it's not exactly useful. And I'm… functionally immortal. I think I can be killed with sufficient kryptonite, or by someone stronger than me, or maybe by magic, but other than that I'm supposed to just keep living. I'm not going to age much past the mid-twenties. I really hate that one. I don't want to outlive everyone I care about."

Lex frowned as he took Clark's hand and squeezed it. He looked like he understood exactly what Clark felt. That seemed a little odd. Lex laughed though it didn't sound anything like a laugh. Clark frowned at him.

"I suppose I am being silly pushing you away then," Lex said. His eyes were haunted and his face was far less guarded than it had been. "That poison should have killed me Clark. The dosage that I was given was almost twenty times a lethal dose for a normal person. My doctors think that I might be immortal too. I've been trying not to think about it."

"Wow," Clark breathed. A grin bloomed on his face. Maybe he wouldn't be alone forever after all.

"As lovely as this is," Mercy said sarcastically, "I'm far more interested in your statement that Lionel's created weapons with kryptonite."

"Oh yeah," Clark said, nodding. "He has. I've seen them."

He explained what he'd seen as Kal. Both Lex and Mercy were grim as he told them about Intergang's super powered members and the special new guns that they had. Clark did his best to describe the weapons to Mercy who apparently knew exactly what they were from Clark's poor descriptions. Once he was done, Mercy went to tell the police that Clark had woken up and was getting dressed.

"All right," Lex said seriously. "I want you to tell them that you're Kal, Clark. I know, I know. You saved my life and you have a lot of information that would be very helpful in bringing Intergang and my father down. I'll protect you. Tell them that you were drugged that summer, that it was the early version of the drugs being used by Intergang and that I managed to rescue you. Tell them everything about Lionel and Intergang."

"All right," Clark said. He sat up and looked around for his clothes. "Um, what happened to my stuff?"

"It was a bit bloody," Lex explained, "and the bullet holes were too revealing so I destroyed it. I've got some clothes that you can wear."

Clark took a very fast shower to get the feel of the blood off of his body before dressing in the outfit that Lex had chosen. It was both a very Kal outfit with tight pants and a too-snug T-shirt while also being a very Lex outfit in that the pants were nice slacks and the shirt was deep purple. Lex looked like he was about to drool when Clark came out of the bathroom. Clark laughed.

"Your fault if you get a woody," Clark said, grinning wickedly at Lex. "You picked them, you deal with it."

"You wear that a lot better than I'd have expected." Lex drew in a shaky breath of appreciation.

"It's a Kal outfit," Clark shrugged. "I can dress nice, you know. I don't because I don't want people to realize how strong I am. It's sort of a disguise."

"I like you better this way," Lex muttered.

Lex let Clark precede him into the living room where the police waited nervously under Mercy's watchful eyes. Clark was quietly amused that even the police found Mercy scary. He winced when he saw the police's reaction to him. They obviously knew that he was Kal. All of them instantly looked suspicious and one of the cop's hands drifted to his gun. Clark scanned them and nodded slowly. The cop with his hand on his gun had traces of kryptonite in his system.

"You do know that Green K is going to drive you mad and kill you eventually, don't you?" Clark said to him. He ignored the other police, Lex and Mercy.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," the cop growled as he glared at Clark.

"It's a mutagen," Clark continued as if he hadn't said anything. "Trust me on this, the longer you expose yourself to that crap the more likely it is that you're going to turn into a meteor freak and go crazy or die. I've seen it way too many times. You're playing Russian roulette and sooner or later you're going to loose."

The other two cops stared at Clark and then looked at the third cop, their eyes going wide. Lex put a hand on Clark's back. Clark wasn't sure if it was to warn him or if it was to comfort him. Clark ignored it.

"You seemed to come out of it okay," the cop said, apparently deciding to brazen it out.

"I wasn't on Green K," Clark said. "I was on Red K, which has it's own problems. The violence, the partying, all of the crazy shit I did two years ago? It was because Red K drives you out of your mind. You either party all the time or you're so full of rage that you're about to tear the world apart. Besides I was already a meteor freak. It hit me when I was two years old. The Red K amplified it, made me stronger, less able to feel pain. It still bit me in the end. If Lex hadn't saved me I'm sure I would be dead by now. Took a long time to come off of it and I'm still really susceptible to it. I'm not trying to scare you. I'm trying to warn you. I've seen way too many people play with that stuff and pay for it with their lives."

"They said that I'd be fine," the cop fidgeted a little. "It just makes you heal a little faster, move a little faster. It's not dangerous."

"That's bullshit." Clark winced inwardly at the swearword but he was being Kal now so it fit. "It changes people. People, animals, plants, no matter what it comes into contact with, it changes you. There's always a price to using Green K. I've seen rose bushes whose sap turns you invisible. I've seen people walk through walls. I've seen glowing green rats that eat like piranhas. I've seen people grow gills and breathe underwater, all because of Green K. So far it doesn't look like it's done too much to you but it is addictive and it builds up in your body. You get a good electrical jolt and your body's going to mutate."

The cop went pale. He swallowed hard and fingered his gun again. The other two cops edged away from him. Clark just looked back at him. They might not believe him, but he still had to try and warn the cop. He was playing with fire and it was only a matter of time before he was burned.

"Wait a minute," the oldest of the three cops said, "you seriously believe this shit? Mutants and powers and…" He trailed off, waving his hands aimlessly.

"Yeah," Clark said, shrugging. He moved at super speed to stand directly in front of the cop, barely a foot a way from him.

"Jesus!" the cop gasped. He pressed back into the couch cushions. The other cop crossed himself like Clark was a vampire.

"I believe it because I'm living it," Clark said calmly. "I'll never be a normal human. I'll never have a normal life. That's part of why I didn't care if the Red K did things to me. It's why I didn't care who I hurt. It's why Intergang's thugs are so dangerous. They're not human anymore and they don't care who gets hurt as long as they get what they want. So you want to hear what I learned or should I go on about how dangerous this stuff is?"

"N-no, let's hear about the attack last night," the oldest cop said.

Clark nodded, sat down opposite them, took a deep breath and proceeded to tell them everything. He told them about being Kal two years ago, how the Red K (which he made sound like a drug, not a ring) had messed with his mind and made him do whatever he thought of. He told them how Lex had found him and saved him. He told them that Lex had found a way to get him off of the Red K. He told them about the meteors in Smallville, the source of the Red and Green K.

He told them about Lex sending him away, the trial, being unable to stay away and then finding out about the attempts against Lex. He told them about how he'd drifted back into his old ways, trying to protect Lex from the sidelines. He told them about the price on Lex's head and Lionel and the Intergang and their weapons and powers and everything he could think of. They took notes and asked questions and eventually the cop who had taken the Green K drug looked at him, his face pale.

"Is there anything you can do to get this crap out of me?" he asked. His hands shook.

"Maybe," Lex said, surprising them all because he'd stayed silent the whole time Clark talked. "I haven't had much success once the mutations have taken place but if you haven't experienced any new powers or physical changes then we might be able to help you."

"Will you testify on this?" the oldest cop asked, studying Clark.

"I…honestly, I don't want to," Clark said, wincing. "My father has a really bad heart condition and I'm scared that he's going to have a heart attack and die. Besides, I can go to jail for all of this, can't I? I did a lot of stuff while I was on Red K that I know is illegal. I wasn't in my right mind at the time and besides that I was sixteen, but still I think I can go to jail for it."

"How old are you?" the oldest cop asked. He eyed Clark in confusion.

"Eighteen," Clark said with a wry grin. "I was sixteen that summer. I ran away from home after my mom lost the baby she'd spent her whole life trying to have. The only reason she lost it was because of something stupid I did. I didn't think I had a home to go back to. I didn't think my parents loved me anymore. I didn't have any friends who'd put me up and I sort of gave up. I was a freak so what did it matter? I was really messed up."

He shook his head sadly. It was the literal truth. He really had been messed up though he was pretty sure a big part of why he'd been so willing to run away do all those things was because he was in shock from the explosion and Mom losing the baby. The oldest cop looked sympathetic. The bad cop looked like he completely understood Clark's reasoning. The third one looked like he'd still like to throw Clark in jail.

"We can discuss some sort of agreement if you'll agree to testify," the oldest cop said. "There's a lot that we can do especially since you were a minor when you committed the crimes."

Mercy appeared with a tray full of food that she set in front of Clark. They talked about it with Lex while Clark ate. After a couple of hours and with Lex's lawyer's assistance, a deal was worked out. The cop who had been working with Intergang went to be checked out.

Clark went highly reluctantly to the prison where the Intergang assassin was being kept. It was the highest security prison in the area. By the time Clark had been checked out and allowed through, he was fairly certain that he'd have a horrible time getting out if it even with all his powers. Lex was with him though so Clark managed to remain calm. Mostly.

"Do your best to get him talking," Lex said as they did yet another check for weapons before allowing Clark into the holding area where the Intergang thug was being held. "No one has been able to get anything out of him yet."

"Shouldn't he have a lawyer or something?" Clark asked. He backpedaled when the cops brought an orange jumpsuit and some truly enormous handcuffs out.

"No, this is different." Lex caught Clark so that he wouldn't run. "We're trying to find out what they're up to. This is more than just getting rid of me, Kal. They wouldn't have all those weapons if they weren't planning something big."

"These should restrain your strength," the cop said with a wicked grin as he caressed the handcuffs. "We're FBI, Kal. We're working with the ATF to shut down Intergang. It's not going to be fully locked and you will be allowed out. We appreciate your help on this. We will be protecting you."

Clark reluctantly put on the jumpsuit, which barely fit across the chest and shoulders. He let them strap on the handcuffs that were far more like mitts than cuffs. He let them strap on the ankle cuffs that made it so that he had to shuffle instead of walk. He listened as they gave him instructions on what to ask and what to find out. He tried not to shake. He tried not to whimper. He tried to swallow his fear and summon Kal's anger. In the end, just before he was taken through the door to the special holding area where the Intergang thug was being held, he turned to Lex.

Lex saw the look in his eyes and stepped close, pulling Clark down into a kiss that set his spine on fire and settled his stomach. Clark let out a shaky breath after their lips parted and smiled. Lex rested his forehead against Clark's. Their breath mingled for a long moment that blocked out everything else.

"I never stopped loving you," Lex whispered. His hands were cool against Clark's cheeks. "I sent you away because I couldn't bear to see you hurt. I couldn't bear to have you see what I needed to do to stop my father."

"Thank God," Clark breathed. The knot of pain he'd carried for far too long loosened inside of him. He smiled and straightened up, putting on Kal's arrogance. He winked at Lex and turned to the FBI, feeling like his spine was at least three inches longer than it had been.

"All right," Clark—no, Kal—said. "Let's do this."

He let them lead him into the holding area, proud, angry and defiant. The Intergang thug started and stared at him. He was in his own set of manacles. His were much more enveloping than Kal's. Kal would have been surprised if he could twitch a finger, much less squirm. They pushed Kal into the cell next to the thug's and Kal went, using his elbow to bump the bars just enough to bend the door. That got him smacked with a baton that broke. Kal laughed at them and they shoved him into the cell opposite the thug's, letting them look at each other.

"You screwed me over," Kal said to him once the cops left.

"Fuck off and die," the thug said.

"Seriously, did you think I wouldn't do it?" Kal asked. He leaned back against the far wall and raised an eyebrow at him. "I had to wait until they calmed down. Scope the place out. Break in next door. You horned in on _my_ hit and then shot me in the back. This is why I didn't want to join up. With a group like that you never know when you're going to get screwed over and you never know when you're going to get that bullet in the back."

"You healed," the thug growled at him.

"Yeah, after being mostly dead for a night," Kal drawled. "Hell if I wasn't as much of a freak as I am I'd be dead for real. I don't _like_ not breathing for hours. Makes it hard to wake up, you know?"

The thug stared at him, suddenly realizing that Kal was serious. He straightened and his neck lengthened at least four or five inches. It was seriously weird to look at but Kal didn't let it show. He was Kal. Nothing fazed Kal. The thug bit his lip and looked away.

"Thought it wouldn't hurt me, did you?" Kal asked snidely. "The great and powerful Kal has no weaknesses so it doesn't matter if a few bullets hit him, now does it? Well thank you very much, I do have a weakness and your big old boss Daddy Dearest knows that very well. He set you up to take me out once I took out his boy."

"No fucking way you know that," the thug snarled, glaring at him.

"Come on, where do you think I got these powers from in the first place?" Kal snorted. "I was one of the first round of experiments. You guys are the next generation, not the first try. There's a cop out there who's the one after you. Daddy Dearest is making his little freak army, giving them nasty little toys and then seeing what sort of damage they can do by setting them loose on Metropolis. Hell, he started with his son. Lex is what gave him the idea in the first place."

"No way," the thug said. He contracted back into his manacles like a turtle hiding in its shell.

"Believe what you like," Kal shrugged. "They tried the Red K on me. Too unstable, made me too mental, too much uncontrollable rage. So they got rid of me and now they're working with the Green K. Kind of wonder when they'll get to the other colors. The black would make perfect twins of people once you'd turned them into freaks." Kal twitched his chin at the Intergang thug, making it perfectly clear whom he thought the freak was.

The thug screamed and bucked against his manacles, trying to work his way free. Kal watched calmly, noting that he probably would break free if given enough time. He had a lot more wiggle room that it first seemed because his body's extreme flexibility but for now the manacles held. He subsided, panting and glaring at Kal.

"I'm not a freak," he snarled.

"Takes one to know one," Kal said, taking an elbow and tapping the wall. The brick crushed underneath his elbow revealing tons of rebar. "Man, they really reinforced this place. I've been a freak since I was two. Lex has been once since he was nine. Why do you think those assassination attempts failed, anyway? He's immortal. He can't die. I'm just really hard to kill."

"Fuck," the thug said as his eyes went wide. "I didn't realize you were that strong."

"Yeah, that was my primary thing before the Red K messed me up," Kal said, shrugging again. "You do realize that the more you do the more fucked up you get, don't you?"

"How'd you end up here?" the thug asked, jerking a chin at Kal.

"Spent the night dead in the morgue and then woke up as they tried to autopsy me," Kal said calmly. "They slapped these on me and hustled me here. I did insist on some clothes first. They weren't impressed enough to let me wear real clothes instead of a stupid jumpsuit."

"That is so wrong," the thug said, shuddering.

"So you understand why I'm a little perturbed at you horning in on _my_ hit," Kal said, glaring at him. "What the hell were your orders? Take us both out?"

"Daddy Dearest didn't believe you'd do it," the thug shrugged liquidly. "He decided you were on Lex's side and that you both had to go."

"Nice to know that Daddy Dearest makes mistakes," Kal said, sighing. "Wonder if his higher ups are pleased with him for nearly killing me. I know they want me back."

The thug's eyes went wide and then he looked away quickly, biting his lip. Score one for me, Kal thought smugly. Lionel does have someone giving him directions. They sat in silence for a long while, Kal waiting until it got to be too much for the thug. He could wait. He would wait. He'd gotten used to silence during Lex's absence. He wouldn't be the first to speak this time.

"No one's supposed to know about them," the thug whispered.

"Told you, I was from the previous round of experiments," Kal shrugged calmly. "I think I'm the last one left. I kind of wonder if they figured out a way to dispose of us. I hate to think the others are kept in a dungeon somewhere."

"They will, won't they?" the thug asked. He turned back to stare at Kal with frightened eyes. "They'll throw me away. They'll destroy me. They're not going to come and get me out."

"You're nothing but a broken tool to them." Kal shut his eyes. "Welcome to the ranks of the failed freaks. We're all expendable. We're all going to be destroyed eventually. God knows the cops aren't going to listen to us. Crazy freaks don't have anything useful to say. Or at least I don't. I'm too far out of current events to be useful. Hey, have you ever been in prison?"

"Yeah." The thug blinked at the change of subject. "Why?"

"Is the food any good?" Kal asked honestly curious.

"It's crap," the thug laughed, shaking his head.

"Damn," Kal sighed. "Guess I'll just get used to it then. There's sure as hell no one who'll care what happens to me."

He shut his eyes again and rested his head against the wall. Kal frowned slightly, smacked his head against the wall hard enough to dent it, and shifted position slightly. He nodded as if that was more comfortable and settled in to wait again. As far as he was concerned this conversation was over and he might as well rest. It only took about another five minutes for the thug to break.

"Hey!" the thug shouted at the door. "I want to talk to someone! Get in here!"

"Keep it down," Kal said with as much annoyance in his voice as he could manage while he was jubilant inside. "I'm trying to get some sleep here. Being dead isn't the same as sleeping, you know."

"Hey! I want to talk to the FBI! Get somebody in here!"

The cops came in to take the thug away and then about three minutes after that Lex came in grinning so widely he looked like he was about to burst with pride. Clark grinned back at him, discarding Kal's attitudes and behavior with relief. The FBI agent who'd put the manacles on him came in, letting him loose. He looked at the broken wall and laughed, shaking his head.

"I'm really glad you're on our side, Kal," the FBI agent said. "I'd hate to have to go up against you. Did you listen to what we told you to ask?"

"Yeah, but I didn't want it to be obvious that I was a plant," Clark said working his fingers happily. "Works better this way. You get to ask your questions and they think that I'm something that I'm not."

"How much of what you said to him was true?" the FBI agent asked.

"Almost none of it," Clark said with a grin. "I was on Red K. I have been a meteor freak since I was two. My parents were apparently killed during the meteor shower and my adoptive parents took me in. Unfortunately, they didn't go through the proper channels, so I've been hiding my whole life. And ever since I came back and started interacting with Intergang I've wondered if there was someone above Lionel, but I wasn't sure."

It took about another hour for them to get out of the prison again, between the FBI asking questions, the warden freaking out at the damage that Clark had done, and the many security checkpoints. Clark breathed a sigh of relief as they walked out into the sunshine and found Mercy waiting with Lex's armored limo. He hoped he never had to go into a prison again in his entire life for any reason. Prisons were seriously creepy.

They drove back to Lex's building, going up to the penthouse. Clark sighed. It was getting close to time for him to go home. He really didn't want to leave. He'd much rather stay with Lex than go back home to the farm and get lectured at by Mom and Dad. Lex smiled at him, offering a bottle of water. Clark took it, leaning against the wall.

"Now what?" Clark asked.

"You go home," Lex said calmly. "I deal with Lionel. I'll let you know what happens in a few weeks."

"Not happening." Clark shook his head at Lex. "I am not staying away anymore, Lex. I can't. You know that I can't."

They looked at each other for a long moment, neither of them willing to bend. Lex looked like he wanted Clark to stay but was determined to have him leave for his own good. Clark had absolutely no intention of doing so. He wasn't going to be able to stay all the time given school but he was going to be there every night to watch over Lex. The inevitable fight was brewing like storm clouds gathering overhead.

"That won't be possible, sir," Mercy said from the door, making them both start. "The FBI has requested that Mr. Kent remain in Metropolis for the duration. He is their best chance of getting information about Intergang and they have many more questions for him."

"I can't do that," Clark squawked. "I promised Mom and Dad I'd be home for dinner!"

Mercy gave him one of those ferocious looks that made Clark positive she knew at least fifty ways to kill him on the spot, super powers notwithstanding. Lex made a distinctly unhappy noise and then winced as Mercy fixed her glare on him, too. Clark tried to hide the grin that bloomed. He was pretty sure he failed from the look on Lex's face. He couldn't help but be amused that Lex was intimidated by Mercy, too.

"I have already taken the liberty of informing your parents that the police have requested that you remain in Metropolis," Mercy said. "Your father was somewhat rude but I was able to explain the gravity of the situation. I have sent people to bring your schoolbooks and several changes of clothing from your parent's farm. Their security has been upped, their phone lines have been de-bugged and a special security team has been sent in the guise of new farm hands to help out on the farm. Your father was not pleased at that but I informed him that his heart condition was worrying you to the point that you could not perform adequately either here or in Smallville."

"Mercy!" Clark squawked as his face flamed.

"Your mother thanked me for that." Mercy smirked at him. She turned to Lex, her eyes cold. "I expect that Mr. Kent will remain by your side, sir. I have your people working on lightweight lead-based body armor for him to wear under his clothes that should aid in protecting him from your father's kryptonite weapons. He will eat with you, go to work with you, and sleep with you."

"Mercy," Lex growled warningly as his face flushed ever so faintly. "You're pushing it."

"He is now officially your personal bodyguard, Mr. Luthor," Mercy said, raising her chin to glare at him. "Mr. Kent has the potential to be very good at that and I will be training him in the mornings and evenings. Given his abilities and personal interest in you, he is a better choice for personal bodyguard than anyone else on the staff. I am your chief of security. I cannot be here all the time."

Lex groaned and rubbed his forehead. Clark thought it sounded wonderful, especially the bit about body armor to protect him against kryptonite. Lex clearly didn't think it was as good of an idea. Clark frowned as a thought occurred to him. He cocked his head at Mercy, hesitating for a second before asking.

"Um, ma'am?" Clark asked. "Didn't we set it up so that Intergang would think that I got caught? Won't they question it that I'm suddenly on Lex's side?"

"Perhaps," Mercy said with a truly wicked smirk, "but we're going with the story that you were addicted to Red K and that Lex helped get you off of it. The story that's been leaked from our staff to the police and from there to Intergang is that he did it by providing you with a different highly addictive substance. He cut you off, you attacked him, he dosed you up again with a more powerful version and you're now even more hooked than you were before."

"Oh man, Mom and Dad are going to freak if they hear that," Clark groaned.

"They have already been informed of the plan and have agreed to play their part in it," Mercy said, looking utterly smug. "Sheriff Adams has also been involved in the deception. She was somewhat surprised to find that you were on the right side of the law after all but she has adjusted to reality quite well. I doubt that you will have as many problems with her once this is over."

Clark looked at her in amazement. He turned to Lex who was looking at Mercy with an expression that was somewhere between approval, amusement and horror at her presumption. Lex raised an eyebrow at Clark's look and shrugged. Clark laughed, shaking his head in amazement.

"All right," Clark said, sighing, "but hopefully you have some obvious method by which I'm getting my 'fix'. It'll be more effective if other people see me getting it from time to time, you know."

"I do," Mercy said. This time her smile held fierce victory mixed with that scary intensity that made Clark shiver. "Dinner has been prepared and should be served in the dining room in one minute. I suggest you eat well. The next few days will be very busy. Feel free to call me if you need me, sir. I'll be reviewing the improvements to the penthouse's security and ensuring that the balcony windows are properly reinforced against further attack."

"Thank you, Mercy." Lex shook his head as she left the room.

Clark sighed and then laughed as he leaned against the wall. He wouldn't have thought that his life could be upended this thoroughly this quickly. Lex looked at him with concern. He stepped close, putting a hand on Clark's arm as if worried about how Clark was handling it all.

"Where in the world did you find her?" Clark asked. "I always thought you were impressive but she's downright scary, Lex."

"She is, isn't she?" Lex chuckled. "Trade secret, Clark. Can't tell you. Besides, I'm not 100% sure where she came from. I'm simply grateful that she's on my side."

"No kidding!"

Dinner had more of Clark's favorite foods than Lex's. Clark had to wonder if Mercy was playing matchmaker or if she was that efficient at discovering information. As the night arrived with his clothes, books and a long message from Mom and Dad detailing exactly how much trouble he was in, Clark decided that Mercy was actually that efficient. He wasn't in half as much trouble as he should have been. Mom and Dad had apparently bought Mercy's explanation of what had happened. From what the note said, she'd built fairly freely off of Clark's phone call and added a lot of details to make it more believable. It was odd to see his lies turned into something that people would easily accept as true.

"Bad?" Lex asked, reading over Clark's shoulder.

"Not half as bad as it should be," Clark said, amazed. "You need to pay her more, Lex. I don't care how much you're paying her. She deserves more. She made my lies _believable_!"

Lex burst out laughing, leaning close to brush his lips against Clark's neck. Clark gasped and rolled his head to the side so that Lex had better access to his neck. Lex didn't hesitate to take the opening. He laid a line of kisses along Clark's neck, setting of waves of pleasure in Clark's body.

Clark pulled Lex onto his lap. Lex smirked at him and set to work stripping Clark's clothes off. Clark returned the favor. They didn't quite make it to the bedroom before they were stroking each other and panting into each other's mouths as they came. They got in the shower to get cleaned up and ended up having another round there. Once they finally made it to bed the third round was slow and gentle, the edge having been blunted at last.

The next day was strange, to put it mildly. Mercy appeared before breakfast, offering yesterday's clothing with a raised eyebrow that made both Clark and Lex turn red. She had the first draft of his body armor, which turned out to be what Clark would call long underwear, except that it was made of a special fabric that had some new liquid/fiber hybrid that absorbed impact to an incredible degree. It didn't matter for Clark, but the liquid/fiber stuff that Lex apparently designed but the explanation for which went completely over Clark's head had lead as a major component, so it would protect Clark against Intergang's bullets on a couple of levels. Clark put the armor on under his clothes and was grateful that he didn't sweat that much. He suspected that a normal person would be sweating like crazy. Clark found it comfortably warm but not oppressive.

Mercy gave Clark some basic lessons on self-defense before they left for work and proved multiple times that no matter how much strength Clark had Mercy could still take him down once he was moving. After he'd been thrown around a little they went to LuthorCorp. Lex did his normal work between dealing with the FBI and the lawyers for Lionel's trial. Clark stayed with him, studying his homework and reading.

Mercy arrived at lunch with food for both of them and a small vial of something that looked like medicine except it was faintly red tinted. Clark made a show of not wanting to take it until Lex ordered him to take it. He made a face, swallowed it and then found to his surprise that it did affect him. He got a little drifty mentally and about a quarter hour later woke up on the couch to the sound of Lex lecturing Mercy. He blinked and sighed with relief that the door shut. After going to all that work to obviously drug him, Lex's lecture would blow the whole cover story.

"That was uncalled for!" Lex snarled. "There was no reason to actually drug him."

"Yes sir," Mercy said. Her growl said more clearly than words that she didn't agree with him.

"Wow, that should have been convincing," Clark said as he rubbed his eyes and sat up. "Who saw?"

"The police arrived as you were falling asleep, Mr. Kent," Mercy said. "It was a harmless sedative. The following 'doses' will only have the sedative in them occasionally. I don't think that it will be necessary every day."

Lex still looked annoyed but Clark grinned. He was glad that she hadn't told him. He would have been nervous about it and would have acted strangely. He would have expected the drug to act much like he did when he was on Red K. Lex sighed as Mercy left the office, a triumphant little smirk on her lips.

"Now I know how to act next time she gives it to me," Clark said to Lex. "It's okay. We'll work it out."

Lex complained off and on through the afternoon but only when Mercy wasn't in the room. Clark was waiting for another attempt on Lex but none came during the day. Intergang waited until they headed home for the next assassination attempt. It came as they headed to the car in the parking garage. Mercy had gone on alert as soon as they entered the elevator, which Lex ignored.

Clark couldn't ignore it. When he thought about it, an elevator was the perfect place for a sudden attack. There wasn't any way out. You had one door in and out that only opened when you were properly positioned. You were hanging by an easily severed cable hundreds of feet above the ground. His newfound nervousness about elevators didn't result in an attack until after Mercy stepped out of the elevator door to look around for enemies.

"Uhn!" Mercy was struck and flung back into the elevator, just barely missing Lex.

Clark caught her, easing her down as she growled at whoever had hit her. Clark sped out of the elevator and grabbed the man clinging to the ceiling over the elevator door. Clark pulled him off of the ceiling and flung him hard down the parking garage floor. The man shouted, glaring at Clark with eyes that glowed ever so faintly green.

"Traitor!" the Intergang thug yelled. "You should be on our side!"

"Not if I want to keep living." Clark glared right back at him. "I want to live then I have to keep him alive."

The Intergang thug snarled and charged at Clark, grappling with him. He was strong enough that Clark was actually pushed back a couple of feet. While he looked ferocious as he snarled at Clark when he spoke to Clark his voice was almost conversational.

"Seriously got you hooked again?" the Intergang thug asked.

"Yup," Clark said as he upped the intensity of his grip. "Sorry, but he was kind of pissed when I came to town. He had me shuffled off safe and didn't like me disobeying orders. This way I do what he wants."

"Fuck," the thug said. He winced at Clark's grip. "Right. Well, sorry about this Kal."

He shouted and shots rang out. Clark grunted as bullets slammed into his back, impacting the body armor that Mercy had gotten for him. The armor blocked the bullets and Clark grinned Kal's wild, wicked grin at the thug. The thug started cursing, struggling harder against Clark's grip. More shots rang out but like the last time the bullets didn't seem to be targeting Clark. There was a thud behind him just about the same time that Clark used Mercy's grab-throw-smack-into-the-floor move to stun and then pin him so that he couldn't break free.

The FBI and Mercy's security team were waiting when as Clark looked up. The thug got taken away in the FBI's enormous manacles and they headed back to the penthouse. Clark sighed with relief as they entered the penthouse. Somehow it seemed safer than anywhere else, probably because of Mercy.

The next day repeated the cycle, except that the 'drug' was faked and Clark pretended to nap for fifteen minutes. That day's attack came as they were driving from the office to the penthouse. The next day and the day after that were the same, with long periods of waiting and brief, unsuccessful attacks. Lex tensed up at first and then relaxed as he and Mercy dealt with the threats coming his way.

Friday was an interesting day. There was a pre-trial hearing. Clark found it fascinating to hear all the arguments for and against Lionel being thrown in prison. Lionel won that round. His lawyers got the judge to agree that he should remain free because no one could conclusively prove that Lionel was the head of Intergang. His smirk on the way out made Clark want to punch him. Mercy looked like her trigger finger was itching as he passed her. Lionel passed her quite a bit quicker than he passed anyone else.

"We're going out," Lex growled that evening.

"Um, if it's to meet that guy that you're paying to do something related to the trial," Clark said hesitantly and then winced as Mercy and Lex both rounded on him, "you might be careful. If you go near him you're going to expose him to Intergang."

"How do you know that?" Lex demanded, glaring at Clark.

"Super ears," Clark said with a shrug. "You never said what he's supposed to do when I was listening but I can home in pretty easily on people."

"Can you hear Lionel?" Mercy asked. Her eyes got that deadly light that made Clark's stomach squirm. He didn't think that she'd ever be anything but terrifying to him.

"Maybe?" Clark said, making a face. "Depends on if I can home in on him and if he's someplace that's seriously soundproofed. I can try. I just can't move around while I do it. It takes too much concentration."

Lex and Mercy exchanged a look that mixed excitement and anticipation. Clark fidgeted. He really didn't know if he could do it. He'd never listened for Lionel as he preferred to ignore the man. Lex made a quick, furtive, and obviously coded call and then Clark found himself flat on his back on the bed with the window open, trying to listen for Lionel. He sighed and shook his head as Lex's scent surrounded him. It wasn't going to work in the bedroom. It was way too distracting.

It did work once he went out on the balcony. Clark shut his eyes and listened hard, sorting through the traffic noise and background hum until he found Lionel's smug tones. From the way his voice shifted slightly he was in his car driving somewhere, talking on the phone.

*I don't care what you have to do, get rid of Lex!* Lionel snarled. *No, I don't want Clark harmed. He's vital to the plan. You know that. Yes, yes, I know that's making it difficult. Use more of the meteor rock then! I don't care what Lex has done to the boy, he can't resist sufficient quantities of it.*

"He's in his car," Clark reported. "He's ordering someone to get rid of Lex, and says that they should use more Green K to stop me."

"Damn," Lex breathed. "Can you tell who he's talking to?"

Clark frowned and listened harder to pick up the voice on the phone as well as Lionel's voice.

*Getting that stuff isn't easy, Daddy Dearest,* an older male's voice drawled sarcastically. *The stuff you've supplied is barely enough for the weapons and the guys. You want us to take out Kal, you're going to need to supply a lot more Green K.*

*I loathe that stupid name,* Lionel muttered, sighing. Clark heard fabric rustle and flesh on flesh as if Lionel had rubbed his forehead or nose. *All right. I'll have more of the meteor rock brought in. Don't waste it. This is a highly limited resource and there is very little of it available in the world.*

Lionel snapped his phone off and went silent but Clark had homed in on the person that he'd been talking to, so he could hear what happened next.

*Guys, we've got another hit,* the older man's voice called. *Daddy Dearest's going to supply us with more Green K and we're taking Kal down and bringing him home. You geniuses figured out what Lex hooked him on yet? I want that kid on our side, not Lex's and not Daddy Dearest's.*

*We think so,* a snappish female voice said. *It's probably a purified, diluted version of the Red K he was taking before. We think we've managed to synthesize something similar but there's no telling until we actually give it to Kal, Boss.*

*Well, hopefully the dart guns will let us do it safely,* Boss Manheim said. *I want that kid taken down. It's the only way we're going to get at Lex and the only way we're ever going to get rid of Lionel.*

Clark's breath caught and he blinked, snapped out of his focus by the surprise of Manheim's words. He was trying to double cross Lionel. They were going to hit him with Red K, which Clark knew was the stupidest thing that they could do. He was far more likely to attack them and kill them while on Red K. Clark shuddered and pushed both Lex and Mercy back into the penthouse, ignoring Mercy's killer look. He made sure that the balcony door was shut and then told them what he'd heard.

"Damn," Lex sighed. "All right, this has gone on long enough. We need to deal with Dad and we need to stop Intergang."

"The FBI won't like us taking summary action," Mercy said. She looked pleased by that thought.

"I could care less if they like it," Lex growled at her. "This has gotten too dangerous and it needs to stop."

Clark relaxed a little as Mercy and Lex went over plans that they'd set up before he'd gotten involved. They seemed to have thought of everything, except for the fact that Intergang's thugs had meteor powers. They both seemed to be determined to leave Clark out of it, which Clark found more and more annoying as they continued planning without him.

"You're not leaving me out of this," Clark declared. He glared at them.

"Clark, you're one of their targets," Lex said before turning back to Mercy.

"So are you and you don't have the powers to be able to stop them," Clark said. He could hear Kal's tones in his voice. "I do. They're not going to be lured out unless I'm there. They want me _and_ you, Lex. If we both go, they're sure to take the bait. If not, they'll likely lie in wait another time when we're not prepared."

Lex bristled as he glared at Clark. There wasn't as much anger in his eyes as Clark would have expected from his disagreeing and blocking Lex's plans. There was more fear and worry for Clark, which made Clark's stomach do odd little flips. Mercy's lips had gone thin but she didn't say anything as Lex and Clark glared at each other.

"I appreciate you trying to protect me, Lex," Clark said a lot more gently. He couldn't help but crow inwardly at Lex's little start. "I really do. But you need me. You need me there to protect you. You need me there to lure them out. You need me, period. You don't have a way to deal with their meteor powers, not unless you've got something hidden in the wings that I don't know about, so I'm going."

Mercy's face went completely still and Lex's eyes slid away from Clark. Clark blinked, staring at the two of them. They did have a way to deal with meteor-powered people. It might be something new and experimental but the way they reacted showed it as clear as day. Clark sighed, putting his hands on his hips.

"Cut that out," Clark growled at them. "If it's a secret say so. If not, then quit being so damned stubborn. We don't have forever. The more time we give Intergang the more likely it is that they'll come up with something that will work on me. And it's more likely that they'll manage a successful hit on you, Lex. We need to stop them so let's get going!"

"How did you know that?" Lex demanded, glaring at Clark.

"For someone who knows you as well as I do, your lies are really obvious," Clark shrugged. "Strangers might not see it but I've learned to. What do we spend all our time arguing about? Secrets and lies. Of course I'm good at spotting them!"

Lex spluttered. Mercy laughed, a strangely joyful sound coming from her. That spooked both Clark and Lex enough that they stopped fighting. In less than twenty minutes they were out of the penthouse and out on the street in Lex's armored limo. Lex's people were flanking them in armored hummers. As far as Clark could tell the secret weapon was at the ready, though neither Lex nor Mercy would tell him anything about it.

It didn't take long for Intergang to attack. They'd only gone six blocks when the engine of the limo sputtered and died. Mercy stiffened, scanning the street for the attack that had to be coming. Clark bit his lip, desperately worried about the other cars around them. They were filled with innocent people who were about to be caught in the middle of a super-powered battle.

Seconds ticked by as the driver tried desperately to restart the engine without success. They all jumped as something--no, some_one_\--smashed down on the hood of the limo. He created a big enough dent in the hood to make the whole limo buck. Time slowed for Clark as he assessed how much damage the engine had taken. Given the depth of the dent and the way the front of the car bowed up, Clark suspected that the suspension was broken and the engine was smashed. They weren't going anywhere in this car.

"We need to get Lex to a different car!" Clark snapped as the Intergang thug swung his arm back to punch through the windshield.

He reached through the window to the driver and hauled him into the back seat just before the thug's punch sent glass flying everywhere. Mercy covered Lex and then they all dove out of the right side of the car. Clark let the driver go, grabbing Lex to hustle him into one of the other cars. He could hear more Intergang thugs coming. They had to get Lex out of here before he was seriously hurt.

"Go!" Mercy roared at Clark.

"I am—!"

Clark felt a tiny sting on the back of his neck just below his hairline. It was above the neck of his suit. He barely had the time to register that he'd been hit by something when the world wobbled. His entire body shuddered with a rush that made him drop his grip on Lex's arm so that he could brace himself against the limo. He heard metal scream and turned to look. He'd dug his fingers straight through the armor plating on the limo. It felt good. Really good. Everything felt good. The sun on his face was so fucking warm, sending little tingles of energy straight through him. The sound of people's voices shouting around him was a distant yammer that couldn't compare to the emotions roaring through him.

"Holy fuck," Kal breathed. He shook his head. Something fell down his back to the ground. He ignored it.

"Good shit?" the Intergang thug asked with a wicked grin. "You can get as much of it as you want if you join us."

"I know what I want." Kal smirked at him.

He swung his arm and connected with the thug's face, sending the man flying. Kal watched at super speed, enjoying the way the thug's face distorted from the impact, the way his blood hung in the air like little liquid rubies. Yeah, that's what he wanted. Those fucking assholes were trying to use him but he'd show them what he was _really_ capable of. It was so easy to pick up the limo and fling it at the group of approaching Intergang thugs.

"Bring it on," Kal laughed at them as they ducked out of the way. "Bring it on, you fucking losers! Show me what you've got!"

"Damn it, we don't want to fight you!" Noose yelled at Kal.

"Too bad." Kal grinned at him. "I'm in the mood for a fight. I told you before what Red K does to me. Let's see if you can hack it until my mood changes."

Noose started cursing. Kal laughed and charged at him. He swung his fist full strength into Noose's chest. Noose did something strange and Kal's hand was caught in a web-like substance. Kal raised an eyebrow and burned it away with his heat vision. He head-butted Noose, sending him flying backwards. Kal loved the way Noose's eyes rolled back in his head as he fell. He'd wanted to do that to the creep ever since he met him.

The other Intergang thugs started attacking, combining their powers to try to trap Kal. They weren't any more successful as a group than Noose had been by himself. Explosions that left craters in the middle of the street did nothing to Kal besides burn his clothes. His suit survived just fine, not even scorched at the edges. Kal decided he hated the color as black wasn't his thing but at least they couldn't hit him with kryptonite bullets while he was wearing it.

They tried to hit him with wind and water and electricity and some strange teleportation thing but none of it did any good. One of them pulled a strange-looking gun and pointed it at Kal, desperation written all over his face. Kal laughed and heated the barrel to force the thug drop it. He advanced on the thug who backed off, his face a terrified mask.

"Kal!" Lex yelled from behind him.

Kal hit the thug hard enough to send the thug through a plate glass window. A bunch of norms inside the store screamed as the glass flew around them. He saw a couple of them clutch bleeding cuts. Like he cared. They'd heal. The thug he'd punched lay motionless in the middle of the glass, bleeding from multiple wounds. Kal looked around for more thugs but they all seemed to have run away or been knocked out.

"Kal!"

"What?" Kal snapped. He turned to glare at Lex.

Kal's eyes burned as soon as he looked at Lex. God that man was gorgeous. Kal had no idea what he'd ever seen in Lana. There was no way she could match Lex's fire and strength. Lex's lavender shirt had been torn sometime during the battle, exposing a creamy expanse of chest and one of his nipples. He held out a hand to Kal. His eyes were so blue that they looked like the pond on the farm in the middle of August when there wasn't a breath of wind. Kal licked his lips, grinning at Lex. Oh yeah, there went the mood shift.

"Kal, you need to stop," Lex said, obviously not catching on that Kal's mood has swung away from battle.

"Okay," Kal said. He walked over to catch Lex's hand to tug him straight into his arms. "I'm tired of fighting anyway."

"Kal!" Lex glared at him. "Let go. We can't do this here."

"Sure, Lex," Kal said. "We'll go somewhere else then."

Kal scooped Lex up in his arms, feeling someone grab him around the neck. He didn't bother shaking whoever it was loose, not with Lex squirming and fighting what they both wanted. Kal went into super speed, heading straight to the penthouse. He took the stairs instead of the elevator, not willing to wait the million or so years it would take for the elevator to arrive and then to carry them upstairs.

The arm was still around his neck when he stopped in the living room, but the person's grip slipped as momentum caught up with them. Kal could stop on a dime. Other people weren't so lucky if he didn't cushion them. It was Mercy. She had a curse on her lips as she few into the wall, smashing a vase before falling onto a small area table and crushing it. She didn't move once she settled. Kal could see her breathing so that was good enough for him.

"There. We're not in public anymore," Kal said smugly as he carried Lex into the bedroom.

"Kal, this isn't the right time," Lex growled. He yelped as Kal tossed him on the bed.

"Like hell it isn't." Kal grinned at Lex's furious glare. "They're beaten. I'm horny. You're the hottest thing on two legs. Everyone else is out cleaning up the mess. I say we play."

"I say we don't," Lex declared as he tried to get off the bed.

Kal blocked him and pushed him back on the bed while holding him down. Lex bucked, trying to get free. Kal laughed, not letting go. He had no intention of letting go of Lex anytime in the next several hours. He'd always been horny as hell on Red K and now he had someone worth fucking, unlike all the assholes and whores he'd encountered a few years ago. Lex's shirt tore easily, displaying Lex's beautiful stomach. Kal grinned and started kissing and nipping his way down Lex's chest. He loved the little marks that bloomed after each nip. The way Lex gasped turned Kal on even more.

"That hurts!" Lex yelped after an especially hard bite.

"You'll heal," Kal said, unrepentant. "Like marking you. Makes you mine. All _mine_! No one else gets to touch you. No one else gets to fuck you. Love you so fucking much and you sent me away."

He pulled back to glare at Lex with burning eyes. Lex was his. He had no right to send Kal away. They belonged together. Lex shivered, his hands braced on Kal's shoulders as he tried to push Kal away. He wasn't strong enough to make Kal move but Kal went with the push, moving down Lex's body until he was looming over Lex's crotch.

"Kal, don't," Lex said. There was warning in his eyes and the way his body tensed. "We don't have time for this right now."

"Why not?" Kal asked. He tore Lex's pants open and tossing the piece of fabric aside. He smirked. "You're harder than I am and that's saying something when I'm on Red K."

"You don't want this," Lex said struggling against Kal's grip. "You'll regret this when you come back to yourself!"

Kal licked Lex's cock and grinned at the way Lex gasped and bucked involuntarily. He snorted, hauling Lex's hips up enough that he could tear the fabric off the back of his pants. Lex obviously didn't get it. He didn't understand what Kal was, how the Red K affected him.

"Of course I want this," Kal said as he pushed Lex's legs towards his chest to expose his ass. "When I'm on Red K all I am is want and need. I want to fuck. I need you. The bullshit I put myself through when I'm not on Red K is the lie. This is me in the truest sense."

He started rimming Lex, all but tongue fucking him to get him ready. Lex cried out something garbled, fisting his fingers in Kal's hair. He pulled hard, so hard that he would have pulled a human's hair out. It felt good to Kal. Lex started squirming, trying to reach something in the dresser.

"What?" Kal asked. He was getting annoyed at Lex's continued resistance.

"Lube," Lex panted. The pupils of his eyes were blown out and his cock was leaking. "Dresser. Lube, Kal. Spit's not enough."

"Glad you're finally on board," Kal purred at Lex.

He draped himself over Kal, rubbing his still suit-covered cock against Lex's naked groin. Lex shuddered and whimpered while clutching Kal's shoulder. He could hear Mercy moaning in the other room. He could hear the traffic outside. More important than anything else was the sound of Lex's heart pounding so hard that it seemed like his heart was trying to beat its way through his chest. He loved it, loved the way Lex whimpered in need. Lex wrapped one leg around Kal's back, kicking him hard enough that it would have left a bruise on a human. It was a love tap for Kal.

"Lube," Lex enunciated so clearly that the impatience almost oozed.

"You got it," Kal said, kissing Lex tenderly. "So looking forward to fucking you."

He pulled the drawer out, finding a little box that felt a bit too heavy for just lube. Kal smirked, raising an eyebrow at Lex. Lex kicked him again, tugging impatiently at Kal's arm and the neck of his suit.

"Does this have a dildo too?" Kal laughed, shaking it at Lex. "Too heavy for just lube."

"Selection of lube," Lex said, growling. "Just get on with it, will you?"

"Your wish is my command," Kal breathed. He flipped the box open to get at the lube.

Lurid green light blazed. Kal gasped and dropped the box. His body cramped, making him whimper. He pulled away from Lex, away from the box. It hurt, it hurt so fucking bad and Lex had done it to him. He'd have broken Lex's neck if only the kryptonite hidden in the lube box hadn't stolen his powers. It had stolen his ability to move. He could barely breath it hurt so fucking bad. Lex shoved at Kal's shoulder, just managing to squirm out from under him. Lex sighed, setting the box of Kryptonite at the small of Kal's back, intensifying the agony.

"Lex…!"

"I'm sorry, Kal," Lex said. His tone was one of honest regret. "Some other time and that would have been a fantasy come true but not today. Not now. Don't worry, someday we'll do this, just not like this."

"Lex…please!"

The pain made Kal shudder and cry out. Lex disappeared into the other room. He could barely hear Lex's voice mixed with Mercy's cold tones through the sound of his pulse throbbing in his ears. There was silence for a minute and then footsteps came back. Kal was barely aware enough to feel Lex's hand on his arm. There was a jab into his wrist just below the edge of his suit and something cool flooded into Kal's veins.

"It'll be all right now," Lex said. "Just rest. When you wake up you should feel better."

Darkness fell over Kal like a mountain falling on him, swallowing him up.

He did _not_ feel better when he woke up. The room was heaving, spinning in circles that made his stomach lurch. There were people talking close to him. Their voices were so loud that it felt like his head was going to explode. Clark wished that it would. He felt terrible. It would be better to die than feel like this. Green K was better than this. Clark whimpered, curling very, very slowly around his head. He was afraid that if he moved any faster he'd throw up all over the bed.

"I thought you had him under control, Mr. Luthor!" Clark didn't recognize the voice of the entirely too loud person, but he had to be FBI from the way he was yelling. "The Intergang members that he attacked will survive but they'll be in the hospital for a long time. The property damage he caused is in the millions and we've only just begun to assess the costs."

"Intergang hit him with some sort of drug," Lex snarled. He kept his tone of voice a good bit quieter but Clark still wished that he'd whisper. "We're lucky that Kal didn't die from an overdose."

"Oh please, he's a mutant," the FBI agent scoffed still much too loudly. "We already know how quickly they heal."

"Lex?" Clark whispered. He knew they couldn't have heard it, so he braced himself and spoke a little louder. "Lex?"

"Kal! You're awake," Lex said. He sat next to Clark on the bed. "How do you feel?"

Clark gasped and clapped a hand over his mouth as the motion of the bed gave his nausea the upper hand. He dove for the side of the bed, his eyes streaming so badly that he couldn't tell if the dark spot under his face was the trashcan or something else. He threw up so explosively that he almost passed out. It took what felt like twenty years of heaving for him to catch his breath.

"Sorry," Clark whispered. "B-bathroom!"

He blinked the tears out of his eyes as hands helped him up and realized that he'd thrown up on Lex's feet. The dark spot had been Lex's leather shoes. There seemed to be more than one pair of hands helping him stand but Clark wasn't clear-headed enough to know who it was. His stomach heaved again once they got him vertical, then again once he was in the bathroom by the toilet. He heaved for a while after that though nothing was left in his stomach.

"He's burning up."

"I know that. I told you, they gave him a near-overdose of something. I presume that it was Red K given his reactions out there. Unlike Green K that causes mutations, Red K removes inhibitions."

"C-cold," Clark whimpered.

He was freezing and yet he was so hot at the same time. Lex pulled off Clark's shirt, which seemed to be a pajama shirt instead of his suit, wrapping a towel around him. The room was spinning again. All Clark wanted was to lie down somewhere warm until the world stopped spinning and lurching. The loud FBI person was still talking but Clark had covered his ears, whimpering.

"Make it stop," Clark begged, keeping his eyes shut. "Make the world stop!"

"Shh, it'll be okay," Lex soothed him. "They've almost finished cleaning up the bed. You can go back and rest in just a second."

"Spinning," Clark whispered. "Everything's spinning."

"It'll stop," Lex promised.

Clark wasn't sure how much time passed because he couldn't remember how to count the seconds. He kept getting four and nine mixed up with two and eleven, not that it mattered. Counting wasn't doing anything to help him focus. It didn't help opening his eyes or closing them. The world still spun and bucked and he was so dizzy. His stomach kept lurching but there was nothing left. Lex gently tugged at Clark's arm to pull him upright. Clark almost made it to his feet before the floor flew up and hit him in the face.

The next time Clark woke up the room wasn't spinning. He didn't feel like he was going to throw up. He felt like he'd been beaten to a pulp, especially his stomach, but he wasn't nauseas. He had a horrible headache. His neck ached. When he very gingerly touched the sore spot on his neck he found that there was a huge bruise or something. Given his faint memory of something hitting him in the back of his neck Clark figured that must be where he'd been drugged. His wrist where Lex had drugged him into unconsciousness wasn't sore at all, thank goodness.

Clark carefully sat up. He sighed that it was sunset outside the penthouse windows. He really could have done with some sunbathing right now. He got up, very carefully got dressed and then slowly shuffled out into the living room. The lights made him wince as his headache went from a dull throb to sharp pains.

"Kal, you're up again," Lex smiled and came over to him. The fact that he said Kal told Clark that they still had cops or FBI visiting. "Any better?"

"Not nauseas." Clark let Lex pull him over to the couch. "I have the headache to end all headaches and I feel like some used a pile driver on my stomach, plus a really nasty bruise on the back of my neck, but other than that I think I'm okay."

"Do you remember what happened?" the FBI agent asked. He didn't seem to be the same person as the entirely too loud FBI agent from his previous wake up.

"Yeah," Clark said frowning. "I remember things afterwards. It just feels like someone else did them."

Clark curled up on the couch, sitting sideways so that he could clutch a pillow to his sore stomach and not have to lean against the bruise on the back of his neck. Mercy appeared with a huge mug of soup, putting it in Clark's line of sight but off to the side. He looked up at her and she looked to him like she was waiting for him to throw up. He laughed quietly, winced at the way it made his stomach feel and took the soup. He carefully sipped at it while listening to Lex and the FBI guy going over everything that had happened since he'd passed out.

"Between the two guns that we captured from the defeated Intergang members," the FBI agent said with clear enjoyment, "we were able to determine that they were experimental prototypes created by LuthorCorp. Better than that, the research program that created them was under Lionel's direct supervision."

"So he's finally been thrown in jail?" Lex asked. His face lit up with glee.

"Yes. His lawyers are trying to get him bail but so far the judge is holding firm," the FBI agent said. "There's a no-contact order so that only limited personnel are allowed to interact with him, and we've got a broad-based search warrant to go through his company to find out what he's been doing with Intergang. We've already got a lot of very good information."

Clark relaxed a little hearing that. He was pretty sure that they hadn't stopped Intergang, but at least they might have gotten the weapons out of their hands. Given that they thought Lionel had people behind him Intergang would probably be back. He hoped that they wouldn't be able to make any more mutants. Too many people had been changed already. Clark finished his soup and stayed silent while Lex worked with Mercy and the FBI. He drifted back to sleep sometime between discussions of how much Lex could contribute to the repair efforts and how much the bail for Lionel should be set at.

The next few days went much more smoothly. Clark recovered completely after a few hours spent sunbathing. There were no more attacks on Lex. Intergang appeared to have gone into hiding. The FBI thought that Clark had taken out half of their members but couldn't be sure. Clark wasn't much help on that front since he'd never met everyone. Noose had been the one focusing on recruiting him.

The day of the trial started so early that it was still dark. Clark woke to the sound of the phone ringing somewhere around 4:00 a.m. Lex grumbled and buried his face in Clark's neck, so Clark wrapped his arms around Lex and tried to drift back to sleep. He didn't manage it. His hearing had kicked in. Reporters of all types, along with normal people who wanted to catch a glimpse of Lex, surrounded the building. The police and Mercy's troops were keeping them back.

The media circus when he woke up seemed to set the tone for the rest of the day. They had breakfast to the sound of Lex's staff fielding continuous calls. They got dressed with Lex's lawyers briefing them on what would happen and what sorts of questions to expect from the press. They had to run a gauntlet of overly-enthusiastic reporters in the parking garage and then Kal had to get out of the limo to clear a path through the crowd before they could actually get out on the street.

He used a barricade in each hand to create a flying wedge that let the limo get through. It wasn't worth stopping the limo for him to get back in so Clark just ran along side it, taking frequent side trips to look for Intergang at super speed. He didn't find them but he couldn't help but think that the trial would be their best chance to get at all of them. He hadn't forgotten Boss Manheim's statement that he wanted Lex and Lionel dead.

Things were much calmer once they were inside the courthouse, relatively speaking. The courthouse was still packed with people but at least inside it was police and FBI instead of reporters. They were hustled into the courtroom under high security. Mercy took one side of Lex, while Clark took the other side. Mercy fidgeted as they waited for the lawyers and Lionel to arrive.

Her twitchiness didn't seem to bother Lex but Clark started getting twitchy simply because she was. It felt like several years before Lionel was brought into the courthouse under guard. He'd been given a suit instead of one of the orange jumpsuits. He looked down his nose at Lex, Mercy and Clark, going to his table at the front of the courthouse as though this was a social engagement instead of a trial.

Clark didn't bother listening to the opening arguments. Instead he listened for Intergang. Mercy seemed convinced that there would be an attack. Clark agreed with her. This was too good of an opportunity for them to pass up. They could get rid of Lionel and Lex while making another attempt to capture Clark. It took nearly two hours for Intergang to make their move. It was just long enough for everyone else to relax. The police and FBI had exchanged their alert expressions and tense postures for glazed eyes and yawns a while before.

Mercy was on her feet with her gun drawn before Clark registered the sound of breaking glass. He stood, whirling to face the Intergang thugs. Before he'd turned all the way around someone's entirely too solid fist or foot connected with his jaw, sending Clark flying into the box around the jury. He felt wood splintering under him and rammed his fingers into the floor to stop his slide. Between the time that he'd been hit and the time he pulled himself back to his feet (less than a second, Clark thought) a dozen Intergang thugs had appeared in the courthouse.

"Here!" Lionel bellowed, calling to them or the police or who knew.

One sword-wielding Intergang thug charged at Lionel, brandishing his weapon. Clark watched Lionel's expression slide from delighted relief to terror as the thug swung his arm up to cut Lionel's head off. Lionel flung up his arm in the sword's path. Clark didn't register Lionel's scream of pain as his hand was lopped off, though he thought the sight of Lionel's blood spurting into the air was going to haunt his nightmares for the rest of his life. He blasted the Intergang thug with his heat vision while the FBI tackled Lionel and hustled him out of the room, blood still spurting from the stump of his arm.

Clark turned to find Mercy battling two Intergang thugs as she defended Lex. He sped over and knocked them aside, letting Mercy focus on making sure Lex was hustled out of the room. Lex shouted something as Clark knocked one of the thugs out and made the other literally bounce off of two of the walls. Clark turned and time nearly stopped as he saw Boss Manheim aiming a gun at his back. A dart was already flying at Clark. Lex had stepped in front of it while Mercy bellowed at him, trying to grab him out of the way. Before Clark could react the dart hit Lex in the chest.

"No!" Clark yelled. Time sped up again.

"You idiot!" Mercy roared, grabbing Lex.

"Ow," Lex said in such a mild tone of voice that it might have been a comment on a paper cut instead of having been hit by a dart filled with unknown and highly dangerous chemicals.

Mercy plucked the dart from Lex's chest, tucking it away into her suit jacket. Lex swayed, his hand going to his head. He toppled for the floor so abruptly that Mercy barely caught him. Manheim growled and pointed his gun at Clark again, pulling the trigger.

"Fuck that!" Clark growled, sliding into Kal-mode from sheer rage that they'd dared to hurt Lex.

He used his heat vision at full strength, melting the dart as it flew at him. Then he blasted the gun in Manheim's hands. The battle was very brief once Clark lost his temper. Mercy had slung Lex over her shoulder and gotten him out of the courthouse the instant he fell, so Clark didn't have to worry about hitting either of them. He was mad enough and worried enough that he didn't care anymore how badly he hurt the Intergang members. Between the FBI's special guns, Lex and Mercy's special weapon that appeared to strip meteor mutants of their powers temporarily, and Clark capturing Manheim and knocking him out, the battle was fierce but very short. Once Clark dumped Manheim into the FBI's hands, he turned to leave.

"You leaving?" the head FBI agent asked.

"I have to make sure Lex is okay," Clark said in Kal's highly annoyed you're-in-my-way voice. "He got hit by the same stuff that I was hit with the other day. He's tough but… I have to make sure he's all right."

"Ouch," the FBI agent winced. He nodded. "Go on. We'll be by later to see how you guys are. Hopefully we've captured enough of them that you're no longer in danger."

Clark nodded and sped out of the courthouse, across town and up to the penthouse. He worried the whole way. He knew how the stuff had affected him. There was no guarantee that it would affect Lex the same way. It could stop his heart. It could mutate him. It could do almost anything to him. Who knew if Intergang had tweaked the formula since they used it on Clark? It could be a completely different drug for all he knew.

"How is he?" Clark asked, stopping next to Mercy.

"He's…" Mercy paused, for the first time that Clark had seen looking flustered before she pulled her icy manners back on, "he's your problem to deal with. He's in the bedroom and I expect that you'll keep him there until this drug wears off. Good luck."

"What?" Clark asked, surprised.

She led the way and then shoved Clark into the bedroom, locking the door from the outside. Clark blinked at the door. Lex moaned from the bed, the sound of the moan making the hairs on the back of Clark's neck go up. He'd never heard Lex make a noise like that before. It was wanton, needy, and utterly desperate. Clark turned and looked, shivering at the sight of Lex lying on the bed. His shirt and pants were open just enough for Lex to get at his nipples and cock. He was pinching his nipple and stroking his cock as hard and fast as he could.

"Oh boy," Clark gulped.

"Clark, finally," Lex panted as he focused glazed eyes on him. "How did you deal with this? This… this… Damn it, I can't think straight!"

"Um, not easily." Clark bit his lip. "I should go get a sedative."

"No point," Lex growled, glaring at him. "Get over here and help me take care of this! Mercy's already given me four overdoses of sedative and it hasn't even dented this thing."

He waved his cock at Clark, making it perfectly clear that he expected Clark to help him deal with the hormones rampaging through his body. Clark hesitated for a moment before going to the bed. He knew what Lex was going through. Lex had made Clark wait until he was off of the drug. He kind of thought he should do the same for Lex.

"If you even think about holding back you'll be sleeping on the couch for the next year," Lex snarled while grabbing Clark and pulling him close.

"But you're drugged," Clark protested. He still let Lex pull him down onto the bed. "You should sleep this off."

"Yes, I'm aware of that, Clark," Lex said with excessively precise pronunciation that showed the level of annoyance and arousal he was fighting. "Unfortunately the sedative is completely ineffective on me even at lethal doses. There _are_ no sedatives that will knock me out long enough for this to burn though my system. So you are going to help me burn this crap out of my system the other way. Activity helps. Sexual activity helps much more. So help!"

He ripped Clark's shirt off, tore open his pants and started fighting with the suit Clark wore underneath. Clark bit his lip and then pulled back. He stripped naked at super speed. He could see Lex's heart racing in his chest. His body did seem to be trying to accelerate to deal with the drug. No wonder the sedative hadn't worked on him.

"All right," Clark said as he pushed Lex back on the bed. "But if you're mad at me for taking advantage of you while you were drugged you're going to be the one on the couch."

"Hurry up!" Lex groaned.

"Lube," Clark said. He grinned at the way Lex snarled at him. "No seriously. You do have lube in the drawer don't you? This time without kryptonite?"

"Yes, yes, God damn it, Clark!" Lex said as he struggled to get at the drawer with Clark draped over his body.

Clark leaned up on his elbows enough for Lex to dig into the dresser drawer. He still wasn't sure that this was a good idea but the more Lex moved the better his body seemed to work. Clark didn't bother with foreplay. It was pretty obvious that Lex was well beyond foreplay by the way he reacted to Clark grasping his cock. He gasped, thrust into Clark's hand and then shoved him down on the bed.

"No arguments," Lex said, using the lube to slick up Clark's erection.

"Lex!" Clark gasped, horrified. "I might hurt you if I take you!"

"I said _no_ objections," Lex said, glaring at him. "Just lie there and let me ride you."

"I'm not sure I can do that," Clark groaned as Lex straddled him and then thrust down.

It wasn't easy at all to lie still. He'd never actually done the fucking before. He'd always bottomed to Lex's top but Lex didn't seem to have any interest at all in topping. He groaned as he shoved down on Clark's erection. The pounding of his heart at his temple and throat eased a little bit until the physical activity drove it back up again. Clark let Lex pound himself down, biting his lip against the driving need to come.

"Damn it," Lex panted. He gazed down at Clark with glazed eyes. "Fuck Clark, how the hell did you survive this stuff? I can't even come."

"You just need more," Clark said, finally letting himself touch Lex the way he wanted to.

He stroked Lex's dick. He was hard as a rock and throbbed in Clark's hand. Lex moaned, his head going back as Clark stroked him and then started petting his chest. Lex nodded desperately, thrusting down against Clark. He was sweating and panting. Clark bit his lip hard against the need to fill Lex up.

"Yes, yes, yes, finally, yes!" Lex chanted as he thrust down on Clark. He squeezed so hard that Clark shouted. Lex finally came.

Clark kept stroking him, expecting it to be over quickly. Lex came, and came, and came for what seemed like forever. Eventually he groaned and collapsed on top of Clark bonelessly. Clark held him carefully as he waited for Lex to catch his breath. Instead he started snoring.

"Well, I guess that's that," Clark chuckled.

He carefully pulled out and rolled Lex over. Lex flopped on the bed like he'd been drugged so maybe the sedatives finally had caught up with the Red K and he'd be able to sleep it off. Clark cleaned both of them up. He was pretty sure that Lex would wake up nauseas as Clark had, so he made sure to have a big bowl and some bottled water ready for him. It took several hours during which Mercy reported that the FBI had captured all of the super powered members of Intergang. To Clark's delight they'd also captured Boss Manheim and most of the normal Intergang members.

"Nnngh…"

"Hey," Clark said very quietly. He sat on the edge of the bed next to Lex with the bowl.

"Bath…room!" Lex gasped.

"Bowl," Clark said, putting it under Lex's face. "Trust me, the bowl's easier."

Lex snorted as he lifted his head to glare at Clark. He went white. He grabbed the bowl and spent several minutes throwing up into it. Clark gently rubbed his back until his stomach stopped rebelling. Once he was one he gave Lex the water to rinse his mouth out.

"No wonder you were so miserable," Lex whispered once Clark had emptied the bowl and returned to the bed. He was still far too pale but it looked like the nausea was pretty much gone.

"It sucked," Clark agreed.

"Intergang?" Lex asked. He took Clark's hand and squeezed it weakly. "Father?"

"The FBI thinks that they've got pretty much everyone," Clark said. "They've caught all the known powered gang members. They got Boss Manheim and about half of the non-powered members too. I checked with Mercy about half an hour ago and it looks like they got all the evidence they need at Manheim's lair to throw them all in prison for life. She said that the Prosecutor was talking about the death penalty for the human experimentation aspect of things."

"Lionel?" Lex asked. He tugged at Clark's hand as if to make him start talking.

"He lost his hand," Clark said. "He also lost a lot of blood and apparently started babbling while they were prepping him for surgery. He's in the prison hospital. They managed to raid his files before anyone had a chance to destroy them and it looks really good for the trial. They said that they want to go ahead with the trial in a week without Lionel in attendance. He'll be watching via video link from prison since everyone's agreed that it's too dangerous for him to be there in person."

"Really?" Lex asked Clark.

"Mmm-hmm." Clark smiled at him. "Get some more sleep, Lex. You need it. I know."

"Agreed," Lex sighed. "Thank you."

"For what?" Clark asked.

"Not leaving me alone," Lex whispered as his eyes slid shut.

Clark blushed and grinned as Lex fell asleep. He tucked Lex under the covers before going to tell Mercy that Lex would be okay now.

The trial took eleven months, during which Clark played bodyguard for Lex. Lionel's hand couldn't be reattached but he got a prosthetic as soon as he could. Clark wondered sometimes if Lionel had any idea how doomed he was. The lawyers had more evidence against him than Clark thought was possible. His people turned against him to testify in the trial. The day that the jury finally went into deliberations was one of the most tense that Clark had ever endured. It wasn't just because of the trial. Mom and Dad had come to Metropolis to be there for the end of the trial. Dad sat next to Lex like he wanted Lex to be the next one on trial.

Everyone was surprised when the jury returned from their deliberations after only three hours. Clark shivered next to Lex as Lionel stood, raising his chin to glare defiantly at the head juror as he read the verdict.

"We the jury find Lionel Luthor guilty of murder, attempted murder…" the juror announced steadfastly.

The rest of his words were swallowed as the crowd watching the trial erupted into cheers. The judge had to clear the courtroom to restore order. Lex hadn't flinched at all when the verdict was read. Clark thought that he and Mercy were probably the only ones who noticed the tiny sag of his shoulders, as if a huge weight had finally been removed.

Mercy got them all out of the courthouse and back to the penthouse with a minimum of fuss. Clark was surprised at how used to the shouted questions and snapped pictures he was. He wasn't the one that they were shouting questions to anymore. It was Lex. Clark was just a bodyguard, albeit a very powerful one. He never would have thought that it would be that easy to hide in plain sight.

"Finally," Dad sighed as he settled into the couch in the penthouse. "You can finally come home again."

"Um, Dad," Clark said, staring at him, "I'm not coming back to the farm. I mean, I will visit but I'm staying in Metropolis. I'd really like to go to college and I've earned enough as Lex's bodyguard to be able to afford it. It's time for me to get on with my life. I'm sorry, I know I didn't say it sooner but I kind of assumed that you knew."

"We suspected," Mom said, giving Dad a fierce look when he huffed and crossed his arms on his chest. "We will want to talk to you about this, sweetie. It's a big step and we are your parents."

"Yes ma'am," Clark said, blushing.

They talked about it for a couple of hours. Clark really liked the idea of being a journalist. He'd seen what Chloe did with it, plus what the reporters did during the trial. He didn't think that he wanted to be on the society beat but being able to report to the world when people were breaking the law and not being punished felt right to him. Eventually his parents went to bed, leaving Clark and Lex alone.

"I do have some issues with you being a journalist," Lex said. "Too many people know about your abilities now."

"True," Clark said with a thoughtful nod. "But I could always get a costume like that Green Arrow guy in Star City. Everyone thinks that they know what my powers are but they don't know everything. We've been careful about that. It's not something that I'd want to do anytime soon. I'd rather get my degree first and then do it."

"Good," Lex said. He looked relieved that Clark wasn't going to rush off saving people right away. "What sort of suit would you want?"

"Well, the one I've got is pretty good," Clark said, tugging at the sleeve of the suit that they'd give him. "I don't like the color but something similar to this in red, blue and gold would be great. Maybe with the House of El symbol on my face. That would make people look other places than my chest. And a cape. I kind of like capes."

Lex laughed, shaking his head at Clark's choice of colors. They both looked up as Mercy knocked on the door. Her face had her normal cold expression but Clark straightened up. Her lips were quirked in a tiny smile.

"You have a guest, sir," Mercy said.

"At this time of night?" Lex asked.

"Yes sir," Mercy said.

"Lex," a tall man with dark hair and snapping blue eyes said as he sauntered in. "I was in town and decided to congratulate you on your victory over your father."

"Bruce!" Lex said. He grinned and stood, striding over to shake Bruce's hand. "Clark, this is Bruce Wayne. Bruce, this is Clark Kent, my bodyguard. We went to school together for years. I thought you were busy rebuilding your manor."

"Pleased to meet you, Clark. Alfred chased me out so that he could take care of things himself," Bruce said. He put a far too familiar hand on Lex's elbow. "I don't suppose that you have the time to entertain an old friend."

Clark stiffened and glared at Bruce. They'd only just gotten rid of one threat and now another one had to appear. Bruce smirked at Clark behind Lex's back. He obviously saw how Clark was reacting. Instead of backing off he put a hand on Lex's back. Oh yeah, Clark wasn't leaving Lex alone with this one, no matter what!


End file.
